


Weaving My Destiny

by EdgePatrol



Category: InuYasha - A Feudal Fairy Tale
Genre: Action/Adventure, Canon, Character Death, Dark Comedy, Death, Murder, Other, Pre-Canon, Prequel, Violence, black magic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-24
Updated: 2018-11-05
Packaged: 2019-05-13 03:24:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 46,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14741135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EdgePatrol/pseuds/EdgePatrol
Summary: After causing the tragic deaths of Kikyou and Inuyasha and watching the Shikon no Tama disappear from existence without being able to stop it, Naraku finds himself in a precarious position. He is still stuck in the burned, dying body of Onigumo and now he has to wait for the Shikon no Tama to reappear in the world.With his initial goal of using the jewel to create the ultimate body being postponed indefinitely, Naraku is forced to come to terms with what he is. His frustration with that revelation only further fuels his destructive, manipulative nature and one night, Naraku discovers that he can reconstruct his body with parts from stronger yokai. Suddenly, his wait for the Shikon no Tama is an annoyance no longer. He might not even need the jewel if he can find the right yokai to build with.Naraku still wants the Shikon no Tama, of course. He certainly won't allow someone else to use it or even worse - purify it.





	1. After Birth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Naraku, a newly-born yokai, examines the aftermath of his interference in Kikyou and Inuyasha's relationship.

Trees were freshly bloomed and the grass was perfectly green, tall, and soft - a stark contrast to the chilled, uneven ground of the dark cave his body had been stuck inside for what felt like years, but in reality, was probably only weeks.

A soft breeze caressed his charred body and carried with it a familiar sharp scent. His lips curled upwards. Blood. This blood was healthy, young, and so pure that it almost burned his already-burned nostrils. The priestess was dead or near death. He specifically slashed her so that she would bleed out slowly, giving her enough time and resolve to extract her misguided revenge, but he was still shocked, perhaps slightly impressed, that she lasted as long as she did.

Another breeze, another whiff of blood - this blood was also young, but carried a more distinct sharpness to it, as if to say it belonged to someone dangerous, someone not human. The hanyou had been injured, it seemed. If all went as he planned, the priestess killed the hanyou, and would be dying soon. No amount of human healing could save her. He didn’t want to go as far as saying that no yokai could save her, though; he was the perfect example saying otherwise.

 _‘I could save her.’_ The thought clawed its way to the surface of his clouded mind. He was purposely concentrating on everything but that little voice. Unfortunately, it wanted to be heard and in this moment of weakness, he could not silence it. _‘I want her alive! That was the deal! Why did you injure her?’_

“It’s what you wanted. The boy was who she wanted. The jewel is what I want.”

_‘I didn’t want her dead!’_

“You wanted to hurt her for choosing him. I may have been a little overzealous with my methods.”

_‘That isn’t what-’_

“You poor, unfortunate soul. You must be either insane, foolish, or desperate to think that any yokai would ever take a deal they make with you seriously.”

_‘I never-’_

“As far as I’m concerned, you’re the one who killed her. I was simply the weapon.”

_‘You will regret this!’_

“I highly doubt that. Farewell.” And with that, he drowned the voice with his own again.

As day turned to dusk, Naraku was finally able to stand, though his footing was still unstable. In an effort to help himself, he used a stick to balance himself as he walked. Luckily for him, he was close enough to the village that he could find a small, flat dirt road to walk on. He had one other issue, though; his appearance. All of his energy was spent to shapeshift into the priestess and hanyou accordingly, to trick them into thinking the other was turning on them, but he could no longer do that. The burned body of the bandit he possessed was spent. It was a small wonder why the man desperately accepted the help of the numerous trapped yokai within the cave. He didn’t even give it a second thought. The useless body was now Naraku’s problem, though.

The situation didn’t get any better for him, either. By the time he reached the village, it was night. The only light from the village was from one particular hut located near the shrine. Two men stood guard outside the entrance, both with solemn expressions on their faces. It was to be expected. The village lost its protector, its healer, its light; Kikyou. Despite being as young as she was, she was a powerful woman. Her death dimmed the village’s future.

 _‘It won’t be long before others hear of her death. I need to take the jewel now. I’m in no condition to even fight these two men, let alone other yokai.’_ Naraku grimaced with annoyance. His footsteps were becoming heavier. Someone was bound to hear his approach eventually. Finding an injured person would raise an alarm, so Naraku could only imagine the reaction to finding a completely burned naked man stumbling around. He slinked behind the home of what he assumed was a family. Different clothes of different sizes hinted at adults and children. He grabbed a blanket and wrapped it around himself, giving enough slack to fashion a hood for himself.

 _‘But first, I need to see her body. I need to confirm her death beyond all doubt.’_ Naraku shuffled back onto the main road. Why he felt so strongly about it was a mystery to him. Maybe a part of him thought that if he saw her dead body, it would silence Onigumo for all eternity.

As he approached the hut, the guard on the left nudged the one on the right and nodded in his direction. They gave each other short, unsure glances. Naraku exhaled with a smirk. These men weren’t killers.

“Who goes there?” the man on the left asked, stepping forward with his spear held tightly in hand.

“A friend.” Naraku answered, slowing his breath down to project his voice.

“No friend of mine hides his face from me. Who are you and what’s your business?”

“I was never given a name.”

“Ominous.” the man on the right said under his breath.

“I am told there is a priestess here, one who can heal even the most grievous of wounds and sickness. I am in need of her services.”

“She isn’t here.”

“Are you saying she is gone or that I have been misled?”

“Misled.”

Naraku smirked again. _‘Smart boys.’_

“We have a couple of inns at the other end of the road, right where it takes a sharp turn to the left. You appear weary and the hostesses are very kind.”

“Ah, thank you.” Naraku began to walk in the direction they pointed.

Instead of heading into one of the inns, Naraku steadily wove between homes, market shacks, and stables until he found himself behind the small hut housing Kikyou’s body. Inside, he heard low voices; one of them being one of the men guarding the entrance of the hut, one of them being another man, and the third from a girl, a very young girl, one Naraku felt like he knew, but couldn’t quite figure out where he knew her from.

“Any disturbances?” the girl asked.

“We had a traveler, a man, asking for her, but we told him he was misled and sent him to one of the inns.” the guard wielding the spear explained.

“A man? What did he look like? Why was he asking for her?”

“He said he was told she was a skilled healer and came to find her, though for himself or someone else, we don’t know. He was covered and wore a hood and carried a stick.”

“Did he give a name?”

“He said he was a friend. I rebuked that statement.”

“Post Ukyo outside with Hoshiyo. Take Etsuko with you to the inns. Find this man. I want to see him and speak with him.”

“Yes, Kaede-sama.”

“Don’t- just be swift. Please.” the girl, Kaede, replied with a strained voice. Once the spear-wielding man left, taking who Naraku assumed to be, “Etsuko,” with him down the road Naraku had walked minutes before, Kaede let out a loud exhale.

“Something bothers you?” the man sitting with her asked. He had a gruff, humorless, experienced voice. Naraku had yet to peek into the window, but he didn’t need to. This man was dangerous in Naraku’s current condition. Had it been just the girl, he would have ended it in seconds.

“Do you remember Onigumo, Kazunori?” Kaede asked. Naraku’s burned body turned to ice. He was dead, as far as they were concerned. Why bring him up?

_‘Now I remember her,’_

“The name sounds familiar.” Kazunori rumbled thoughtfully.

_‘Kikyou’s young sister,’_

“He was that awful man that my sister took pity on a moon or two back.”

“Oh, the cave-dweller,” Kazunori stated, his tone taking on all the disgust that Kaede’s soft voice lacked. “What about him? He’s dead.”

“I’m...not so sure about that.” she replied carefully.

 _‘You’re as dry as ever, child.’_ Naraku remembered the few times she visited Onigumo. She was forced to promise Kikyou that she would take care of the man in her sister’s absence. Kaede made sure to stress that fact to the crippled man. The few times she fed him or changed his bandages, she would remain silent unless the bandit said something beyond forgiveness. _‘No doubt she told her sister all about Onigumo’s Kikyou-fantasies.’_

“What do you mean? Kikyou-sama said it herself - one of the candles she left must have caught onto his bandages. She prayed for forgiveness with me.”

“Dark times are upon us. I loved my sister, but I cannot deny the human she was. Her attention to her mission was divided because of her feelings for Inuyasha. She lowered a lot of her spiritual defenses, and ours, to allow him to come and go as he pleased. He isn’t the only one who abused that window, I’m sure. That cave is cursed, the place where Onigumo’s body laid is cursed, no trace of him left, not even ashes, and only days after the fire, my sister is dead?”

“I understand your worries. Kikyou-sama certainly did not do us any favors where the half-breed was concerned. She didn’t do herself any favors, either.”

“No, she did us no favors where Onigumo was concerned. Inuyasha was impulsive and insolent, but he had multiple opportunities to wipe out our entire village and-”

“He killed seven of my men, good men, all had wives and children,” Kazunori insisted strongly, his voice saturated with hatred and restrained anger.

Naraku held his breath to keep from laughing. He knew there would be some collateral damage, but he hadn’t planned on Inuyasha actually killing villagers. Had the hanyou been so upset that he gave up any moral obligations he had to his human side? Was that the real reason why Kikyou decided to kill him? Attacking her was enough, but to kill those she was sworn to protect after everything she gave to him? That was delightful! 

“Not on purpose.”

 _‘Damn it. Even in death you couldn’t even allow me that satisfaction.’_ Naraku was unsure if he was speaking of Kikyou or Inuyasha at that point anymore.

“It was on purpose, as far as I’m concerned. No one held a blade to his neck and forced him to attack us, to steal the cursed jewel, or to betray Kikyou-sama’s trust and attack her.”

“That is...a fair perspective, Kazunori. I am sorry. I met Inuyasha a few times and he was different from all the other yokai that I’ve seen. I felt safer around him than around the crippled bandit.”

“That is because he wasn’t a yokai; he was a hanyou. The human side gave him the ability to convince us he was harmless; the yokai side gave him the motivation to be the complete opposite.”

 _‘This man is simultaneously wrong and correct. With him around, this village might survive.’_ Naraku looked down at his hands. _‘I cannot allow that.’_

“There is one thing I don’t understand,” Kaede’s voice was barely above a whisper and softly broke the silence. “My sister took the Shikon no Tama with her. She had it when she was attacked.”

Kazunori gasped and the floorboards groaned when he shifted his weight. “What? Why would she do that?”

“I do not know. Kazunori, you must not tell anyone that she did that. My sister made mistakes, but if we foul her memory, her spirit will not protect us.”

“If she took it with her, why would the hanyou bring it back to the shrine just to steal it again? Why not just take off with it after attacking her?” Kazunori asked, his voice also softened to a whisper.

“Exactly.” Kaede said strongly, but still quietly. “Onigumo, the cave, Inuyasha suddenly turning against my sister, the jewel’s whereabouts when this all happened - it doesn’t add up.”

 _‘Oh, both of you certainly need to die now.’_ Naraku’s jaw tightened. Days from then, did he care if the truth came out? No. He almost wanted it just to taste the tears of everyone who loved Kikyou. However, at that moment, in his condition, in the middle of the village mourning Kikyou while thinking Inuyasha was to blame, the truth would mean his death. _‘When I take the jewel, none of it will matter.’_

“I wonder what is taking Yoshike and Etsuko so long,” Kaede said, sounding tired for the first time that night.

“They are probably trying to be quiet about it. That situation requires a few more minutes.”

“I see.” Kaede sighed. Then she lowered her voice to a whisper. “Sister, what happened?”

“It was such a beautiful day, too. It mocked us.” Kazunori stated with his own sigh. “I will always despise the fact that we could not reach her in time. I will despise it and regret it until the day I die.”

 _‘Luckily for you, you won’t be regretful for long.’_ Naraku steadily leaned his head towards the window. He could hear the crackling of the fire and smell the burning of wood. The heavy stench of preservation herbs permeated the air as he slid closer. He caught a glimpse of Kazunori. The man was as big and as muscular as he sounded. His large body must have obscured Kaede’s from that point of view because Naraku could not see her anywhere else. Their shadows danced wildly with the movement of the flames. On a bench beside Kazunori, sat various iron tools with points, sharp edges, and clamps - all looking ominous in the dim light.

“You should get some sleep, Kaede-sama. At dawn, we will release Kikyou-sama’s soul from her body and hope that she will protect us.” Kazunori suggested. Naraku stopped himself from snorting. Instead, he rolled his eyes and silently mocked the man’s words.

“No. She was my sister and my mentor. I will stay with her until her ashes are buried. Speaking of, is the urn ready? And the pyre?”

“Yes. Both are behind the shrine as she instructed. She did not tell us where to put her ashes, though.”

“I know exactly where she would want them to go. While the pyre burns, I will dig.”

 _‘Odd. I assumed Kikyou would have wanted to be preserved, mummified even, to let her spiritual powers soak into the land.’_ Naraku thought, tightening and loosening his grip on his walking stick with boredom.

While stuck in the cave, Onigumo asked Kikyou all sorts of questions, but the ones that gave him the longest responses were the religious ones. Kikyou spoke of different practices, and she even told a story of a man, a saint, who fell ill, but because he didn’t want his people to suffer after his death, he offered to be buried alive to become an immortal protector. His mummified body held a holy barrier that purified the air, the plants, water - all things living and not around the area where he served. Kikyou offered to take a piece of Onigumo to that area when he died, to purify his soul and absolve him of his sins, but he declined spitefully. The man was far from pious. He only engaged in those types of conversations because he enjoyed the sound of Kikyou’s voice.

 _‘It was as close to fucking as I could get.’_ The thought wrenched him from the memories and made him cringe. Countless yokai made the cave their home. As Kikyou’s relationship with Inuyasha blossomed, her powers waned. The cave was one of the few places the extremely weak yokai could be safe from her while being right next to her, waiting to strike. Every yokai in that cave assimilated into this single human man’s crippled, torched body. The pressure compacted them into two separate entities; Naraku and Onigumo. Naraku could remember everything that happened in that cave from hundreds of perspectives, including Onigumo’s. Onigumo, being human and near-death, couldn’t fight off Naraku’s consciousness, but every now and then, his thoughts, his awful, annoying feelings, would leak into Naraku’s head and every time, for a split second, he would think it was one of his thoughts.

Time was ticking away. Every second that passed was a second the two guards would return to tell them the mysterious hooded man was gone. Kaede’s paranoia would require a search of the village, to make sure her precious sister’s body and jewel were still in place. He was not fast enough to evade them.

 _‘I will lean in, look at her, and then leave to take the jewel.’_ Naraku told himself, irritated that he had to pep himself up to look at her body. Moving his head to look in felt like pushing a mountain. It was almost as if his body - no, the bandit’s body! The miserable bastard’s body still had a link to Onigumo and Onigumo wanted Kikyou alive! It was actively resisting him for the sake of its old master’s fragile heart! _‘Why are you reluctant to look, Onigumo? Don’t you want to see what you did to her?’_

The resistance broke and Naraku almost lurched forward, but he caught himself with his stick and hand pressed to the side of the hut. He waited for a moment, to hear if the two humans inside heard him, but neither reacted.

 _‘Did you run out of energy or were you hoping they would hear me?’_ Naraku knew he wouldn’t receive a response. _‘Now, let’s have a look at our beautiful, dead priestess.’_

There was nothing extravagant about the body, but to Naraku, it was magnificent. It was victory. It was freedom. With the exception of the ashen paleness that dead bodies developed, she looked as if she was asleep. The sharp and soft scents of various herbs and spices told him that her body had been washed. The claw injury he inflicted on her shoulder was mostly covered by the plain white katabira she wore, but a slight sliver of red was visible where the cloth met her neck. His eyes lingered there the longest, admiring his handiwork. When his gaze shifted to her hands, he gripped his stick so tightly he was sure it would break!

_‘That bitch!’_

Resting on her chest, woven between her fingers, which were posed in a triangular shape, was the Shikon no Tama and the necklace piece attached to it! The pose her fingers were fixed in was a gesture she often made while casting her most powerful purification spells, ones that required her utmost concentration, and it mocked Naraku and every yokai that assimilated into him. As if the situation couldn’t get any more frustrating, a protection sutra had been placed on her stomach, in plain view as if to tell everyone, “No evil can touch her.” The patterns looked similar to those she drew in the dirt at the entrance of the cave when she first found the bandit.

 _‘It’s specifically meant for her and her blood.’_ Naraku glanced over at Kaede, who was reading from a book of what he assumed to be Kikyou’s spells. As long as Kaede was near, she was also under the spell’s protection. Naraku couldn’t touch either of them. If he had been Onigumo, he would have thrown a fit, smashed or broken something, but instead, he remained still as a statue and as silent as the dead Kikyou. Only then did he begin to notice the extent of the discomfort of his body. He couldn’t feel the pain, but he could feel the resistance of the remaining skin and muscles pulled over bones, the trembling of the legs that only held the body up because he willed them to, and the tingling numbness of what would be pain.

 _‘Even in death,’_ he thought bitterly. _‘I must move on. The deterioration is worsening and soon I will be in the exact position Onigumo was stuck in.’_ He began to walk away until he heard the gruff voice again.

“What of Inuyasha?” Kazunori asked, breaking the silence.

“Leave him. He can no longer harm anyone.”

“But he’s right at the entrance to our village, our land,”

“And he can no longer harm anyone. Like I said, Kazunori, dark times are approaching. Onigumo was an omen, a despicable bandit who was the product of war, and he reached as far as our land. The wars will follow. Without my sister, we must endure. I’m nowhere near as powerful as she was and I never will be. We are going to have to cut down on excess. Our nice stone walkways, buildings, perhaps even our beautiful shrine, will eventually have to come down to help us survive.”

“I understand.”

As he left the village, Naraku followed the scent of the hanyou’s blood. Kaede and Kazunori spoke of leaving Inuyasha’s body at the edge of the village, right where everyone could see him, and as much as Naraku loved the idea, it was exceptionally cruel for someone like Kaede to suggest it, especially since she spoke somewhat in Inuyasha’s defense to a village elder she looked to for advice.

“Oh,” Naraku said, finally understanding what they meant. At first glance, the white-haired hanyou looked like he was asleep. Bleeding out and near death, Kikyou’s aim with her bow was still unrivaled. Even he had to admire her precision. She pinned the young man to a tree with an arrow through the heart. Using a finger, Naraku traced the path of the arrow, using the angle from which it stuck out of the young man’s chest, to pinpoint right about where Kikyou stood when she unleashed it. Using the scent of her blood, he concluded that she stood at the top of the steps, right where he was standing, and shot the man she loved through the heart. She shot him with so much hatred, hurt, betrayal, and anger that the arrow firmly held him above the ground. Naraku smiled and descended the steps.

 _‘A pretty one, weren’t you?’_ Naraku observed once he stood right in front of the hanyou. Dressed in rich red robes and matching hakama, with long white hair and pointed dog ears on top of his head, Inuyasha was definitely one of the, “lucky ones” in terms of hanyou appearances. Many took on a grotesque appearance, much like their yokai parent, with some human attributes, but Inuyasha was mostly human with the exception of the hair color, ears, claws, and, Naraku assumed, fangs. _‘And yet he despised his appearance and wished to change it. How privileged of him.’_

He reached out to flick the arrow with his fingers, but when his hand was mere centimeters away, it began to sizzle. Naraku pulled his hand back to himself and stared up at the hanyou with confusion. The hanyou was dead, but the arrow was not. Naraku pressed his hand to Inuyasha’s clawed hand and gasped. It was warm! That wasn’t right!

 _‘He should be cold!’_ Naraku grit his teeth when the realization hit him. _‘She didn’t kill him! She bewitched him! She spared him! Both of their deaths were supposed to taint the jewel and she...spared...him! Why?’_

He limped away before he lost his patience.

 

* * *

 

The sun had only begun creeping up over the horizon when Naraku finally saw the smoke rising from her pyre. He had retreated to the forest and found himself back at the spot he sat the previous day - waiting, planning, remembering - it seemed like it happened years ago. It didn’t take him very long to make peace with the situation and now he watched the smoke spread with a small smile on his face.

 _‘The Shikon no Tama will reappear, Kikyou. You couldn’t purify it out of existence with your precious half-breed and you certainly didn’t purify it with those unresolved feelings you died with, either.’_ He was certain that was her original plan before he interfered - to purify it by turning Inuyasha human - but he found himself wondering if she ordered the jewel to be burned with her not to temporarily deter dangerous beings from possessing it, but to attach her soul to it instead. Whenever the jewel decided it was time to reappear in the world, so would Kikyou’s soul. She was its guardian, so she knew better than anyone that directly using the jewel to save herself would have resulted in her and the jewel being corrupted. Instead, she opted for a loophole. Naraku snorted. _‘I’ll wager she had a fleeting hope that her reincarnated soul would find its way back to Inuyasha and start over. And yet, she called Onigumo selfish for wanting to use it for something similar.’_

As the wind blew, the tower of smoke billowed and faint singing could be heard. The villagers were honoring their dear priestess with quite the show. Naraku almost wished he could have watched it, but he had other, more important matters to handle now that his option of using the jewel was gone.

_‘This spent body and all of the irritating thoughts and feelings that come with it needs to go.’_


	2. Hanyou

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After hitching a ride to a new village to heal, Naraku begins exploring exactly what he can do in terms of yokai abilities and his influence on the people of the village. He soon discovers what he really is.

 

Flames danced along the dusky skyline, growing taller and moving wildly which each passing moment. The sky was a brilliant mix of orange and blood red, signaling the end of another day. According to the elders of the little mountain village, it was also a bad omen. It meant someone died tragically or violently. As annoying and quaint as the idea was to Naraku, it wasn’t inaccurate either, which mildly frustrated him. The sky held a similar color the day Kikyou died by his hands - tragically and violently - and now it held the color for the mountain village’s young, unsuspecting healer who was simply trying to ease the pain of a severely-burned man who stumbled onto his property. The rest of the villagers were unaware of this change, though. As far as they knew, their handsome healer was alive and perfectly healthy and the mysterious burned man did not make it through the night. So, to spite Onigumo one last time, Naraku built a pyre and set the man’s used body ablaze once more and was staying to make sure every piece turned to ash.

“We ask the spirits of our fathers and mothers and their fathers and mothers to guide this man’s tortured soul to peace!” an old man wailed as he threw grains into the flames, causing them to crackle loudly for a moment.

' _Pray all you want. He will never know peace. I made sure of that.’_ Naraku thought, keeping his mouth still. Smiling at the moment would have been inappropriate and Naraku wasn’t quite ready to rock the boat with his new experiments yet. He opened and closed his hands, expecting to feel resistance, but the healer’s body was healthy. It didn’t require the will and strength of a yokai to move. His hands opened and closed again; it was something he suspected would be a habit until he could get used to having a working body.

“Did we ever learn the man’s name, Satoshi?” the old priest asked, now staring at Naraku. 

“No.” Naraku replied quietly, knowing that a speech about bad omens was going to come spilling forth from the priest and other elders.

Immediately, the priest’s eyes grew huge with worry as he glanced back at the other elders, nervously adjusting his eboshi on top of his bald head. “That isn’t good. We cannot put a spirit to rest without knowing its name.”

“There is no guarantee his spirit will haunt us.” Naraku argued, already growing tired of the elders’ paranoia of evil spirits. Again, he had to stop himself from smiling, chuckling, and rolling his eyes. They weren’t wrong! Naraku was an evil spirit by definition! But it was still so annoying that it was their first response to anything unfortunate.

“They say a spirit whose name is not known will undoubtedly curse those who forgot or never asked.” another old man called out in a gruff voice.  

 _‘This is cursed, that is cursed, you are cursed, this random burned man we only knew for a few hours is cursed,’_ Naraku thought half-humorously and half-irritably. He reminded himself that they still weren’t wrong. Admitting that only seemed to deepen the distaste he already held for these people.

“Satoshi-sama, the sky,” the priest insisted, pointing up. “Over our village, it has painted a tale-”

“Of doom, death, and blood, yes.” Naraku cut him off softly as he stepped forward. He had heard the priest’s concerns several times already and he was beginning to think the healer’s memories of exasperation towards these speeches were leaking into his mind just like Onigumo’s feelings for Kikyou had. “How do you know the sky isn’t painting the story of our unlucky visitor? You do know that this same sky floats over countless other people and cities dozens of times the size of this little village? How do we know it isn’t telling a story of someone from elsewhere?”

That stumped the old man, which pleased Naraku and soothed the burn of agitation he was feeling.

_‘Now is a good time to sow the seeds of doubt and mistrust between them. At least half of these people are desperate to believe their home is safe and will cling to any explanation that preserves that belief.’_

“My kind neighbors,” he began, thinking that was a subtle enough term to win them over. “We mustn’t worry ourselves with omens and spirits. We must worry about what we can control; our homes, our crops, and our families. If a vengeful spirit did overtake this village, what would we do?”

“We sent for Kikyou-sama the last time.” a middle-aged man called out. “She repelled the yamauba farther up the mountains.”

“That’s no longer an option for you. Priestess Kikyou is dead now. I passed through her home on my way here on the day they burned her and buried her ashes. I wager the blood sky is telling us her story.” a strong, stoic voice explained. He was a seasoned trader and traveler with a thick beard and thick muscles. His wagon was the one Naraku snuck upon the day before to reach this very village. At the pitiful speed Naraku had been moving in Onigumo’s body, the trader was able to make a stop in Kikyou’s bigger, more prosperous village, trade wares for a couple of days, and catch up to Naraku unknowingly.

“Oh,” the old priest wailed. “That is the worst omen of them all!”

 _‘You have lived far past your time, old man.’_ Naraku decided to mark him as his first test subject. With the body of the healer came the memories and knowledge of a well-educated human being and with all of that came a burst of curiosity and motivation from Naraku who only had knowledge of the anatomy of the yokai that created him. Satoshi had studied under several experienced healers and saved many lives throughout his short life. He was even able to mix a drink that eased the pain of Onigumo’s burns. Although he couldn’t feel the pain, Naraku could feel the body’s sigh of relief. _‘Onigumo may have been worthless, but he was incredibly resilient to have lived with those injuries for as long as he did. Is every individual body capable of that or is there something else to it? I want to know.’_

He looked back at the raging pyre and sighed. It was going to be a long wait for the Shikon no Tama to reappear, but he had plenty of time to experiment and now, a new pile of knowledge to dig through and a new pile of human toys to play with.

 

* * *

 

 _‘So, when I pull this tendon, the entire arm should move.’_ Naraku told himself. Satoshi’s gentle stream of memories were far easier to control than the tidal wave of Onigumo’s. Satoshi was a man of reason and discipline, while Onigumo was irrational and impulsive. Naraku suspected the reason most humans preferred knowing someone like Satoshi was because they were easier to control and predict. Onigumo was impetuous and uneducated, which resulted in him being unpredictable and aggressive. The village elders looked to Satoshi for answers dealing with anything outside the spiritual realm and they looked to the old priest, Omezo, for advice concerning the spiritual realm and family issues. The scale between the two was balanced and peaceful until the previous day when poor, old Omezo met his unfortunate end with, “something ominous,” as Naraku put it to the elders when he examined the body. They didn’t catch his tone.

“Heh, I’m sure you wouldn’t think it was funny, either.” Naraku said in a low voice, staring down at the old man’s face, which was permanently frozen with an expression of pure terror. He wanted to study the body, so Naraku severed his arm and ripped open his chest during the attack, giving him an excuse to dig around the man’s body without skepticism from the others. He already fished around for the old man’s heart and lungs, both of which were relatively healthy for someone his age, according to Satoshi’s notes and memories. Omezo would have lived on a bit longer if not for his constant wailing about omens and spirits. “Raise your hand if you didn’t think the sky spoke of your fate.”

With a light pull on the stringy tendon, the priest’s old, wrinkled arm bent upwards while the hand bent back from the movement. Naraku began tugging the tendon quickly, jerking the arm back and forth and in turn, causing the limp hand to wave. Naraku chuckled and almost wished someone was there to share the humor with.

 _‘If I could find a way to control tendons from the outside, I could become a great puppetmaster. The person would remain aware of what was happening all while having no control over their body.’_ The thought of the amount of agony that would cause brought a gentle smile to his face.

Naraku was able to sew the chest shut by the time Omezo’s granddaughter arrived to inform Naraku of the burial style the family wanted. Her soft voice called out, “Satoshi,” and at first, Naraku didn’t react because it wasn’t his name. When she said it a second time, he beckoned her in and pulled a bloodstained white sheet over Omezo’s body in an attempt to, “protect her from the horror,” or whatever Satoshi called it. Something told him his entire torso and arms covered up to the elbows with the old man’s blood would negate that effort.

The young woman’s gaze immediately hit the floor when Naraku turned around. He took his chance to grin before forcing it away. The woman took a moment to smooth away wrinkles on her blue kimono.

“I am sorry for your loss.” he said soothingly. It felt odd speaking in such a way, but it worked wonders when it came to controlling a conversation.

“Thank you, Satoshi. Forgive me for being late. I was feeling ill this morning.” she replied, bowing slightly. “Is he...whole?”

“Almost. There was more damage than I originally noted.”

“I will see him.” her soft voice hardened and she was able to look him in the eyes. “Please.”

“Of course.” That was an interesting turn. He expected her to refuse to look until he was finished putting Omezo back together. Naraku motioned for her to approach as he turned and pulled the sheet from the body.

He waited for tears. None came. He waited for a sob. It never came. Her brown eyes remained as dry as Naraku’s and her expression was vacant, almost as if she had convinced herself that she wasn’t staring at her dead grandfather.

_‘Is she...like me? Is she able to control herself entirely?’_

She cleared her throat. “His face,” 

“It is common.”

“He almost looks like he’s...laughing.”

Naraku blinked and looked back down at the old man’s face. She was correct! The horror-stricken expression was now pulled back into a wide-eyed fit of hysterical laughter. The rigor must have set in while he was playing around with the organs. Or, perhaps, Omezo found Naraku’s jokes to be funny after all. “Oh. That is different.”

“Different?”

“It didn’t look like that earlier. How interesting.”

“I thought you said it was common,” she retorted accusingly, now staring up at him with a frown.

“It is. However, I didn’t expect that much of a change.” Naraku explained quickly. She seemed to accept his answer as she nodded and looked back down at her grandfather.

“Can you make it stop?”

“I can try.” Naraku didn’t want it to stop. It was rather comical. He figured he could tell the family he tried and just leave it.

“His arm?" 

“It will be reattached.” Naraku was now growing impatient. If she wasn’t going to shed at least a single tear, she was useless to him at the moment. “How do you want him to be prepared?”

“We will bury him. Just make him look as peaceful as possible.” she ordered. The woman was apparently impatient, too. Her tone was sharp and Naraku took it as a challenge.

“As you wish.” He moved towards the body in an attempt to make it look like he was going back to work on it. Instead, he slipped his fingers into the arm, finding the tendon and giving it a single, solid tug.

The arm shot up. The woman gasped, almost shrieked, as she jumped back. Then, she fainted and crumpled to the floor, her black hair falling out of the loose bun style she used to keep it pulled back. Naraku released the tendon and looked down at his unconscious visitor. His amusement was suddenly clouded by disappointment.

“A shame.” he sighed. “It seems you were barely putting on a front after all.”

He decided to take the woman back to her family, which took longer than he anticipated because he had to clean the blood from his arms, and she had started to regain consciousness, so Naraku applied pressure to the artery in her neck - another trick Satoshi knew - and kept her unconscious. After leaving Omezo’s family home, Naraku added his granddaughter to his list of future test subjects. She was resilient enough to put on an emotional front when seeing her grandfather’s mutilated corpse, so perhaps she was resilient enough to withstand physical pain, too. It was a weak attempt on her part, but it was still better than most.

 _‘Your face can stay that way.’_ Naraku thought when he returned to Omezo’s corpse. _‘That should upset them.’_

The following day was Omezo’s funeral. Naraku stood off to the side so he could look upon each and every face, most of which were moist from tears. A few of the men decided tears were unnecessary, but their fear was easy to read. He could almost taste it.

As each person approached the freshly dug grave to place flowers on the mound of dirt and to whisper prayers, something else began to swell from the emotions. More people began to notice something was wrong, that something missing, and were looking around carefully with wide eyes filled with concern. Excitement began to build in Naraku’s chest. It was a recent sensation to him and he wasn’t sure he liked it or not.

“Where is Misako?” a woman whispered to another, holding her babbling infant close to her chest. The other woman spun around to search and Naraku strained his ears when he heard more murmurs.

“It isn’t like her at all. She would never miss her grandfather’s funeral.” one of the older women stated strongly, motioning for a few men to follow her.

 _‘Well, she is going to miss it.’_ Naraku looked down as he smirked. The woman lasted longer than her grandfather, but not by much. The front she put on for him the other day must have been situational, because she was barely able to pull herself together when the healer she trusted with her life dragged her from her home and into the woods. Several years of trust was broken in seconds and to his surprise, she didn’t once blame evil spirits for what was happening to her. She truly believed that sweet, soft-spoken Satoshi was capable of such an act.

 _‘Now that I think about it, Omezo didn’t blame evil spirits in his last moments either.’_ Naraku crossed his arms and closed his eyes, watching the event in his mind all over again. _‘I wager it was all an act to gain the trust of gullible, ignorant people through their fears. Well played, old man.’_

Now the scene of Misako’s last moments played in his head. He debated keeping her alive, to see if he could convince her to join him in his experiments. He wanted to know how long it would take for her to build up a tolerance to visual horrors, but once she begged him not only for her life, but for that of the unborn child within her, Naraku couldn’t resist. He even gasped and smiled uncontrollably when she told him. Most of the women in the village were either too old to bear children or already had theirs and weren’t carrying another. He wasn’t sure when he would have another chance to see one so early on in a pregnancy and for once, he wasn’t willing to be patient.

“I don’t think they’ve found her.” a man said to his wife, choking on his words. When Naraku saw the tears building up in his eyes, he tilted his head with interest. He didn’t remember the priest’s granddaughter being anyone of importance - why cry over her? She meant nothing outside her family.

 _‘I’m not complaining; tears are tears.’_ Naraku didn’t think about the funeral taking longer due to Omezo’s missing granddaughter, but he kept reminding himself that he had all the time in the world. He was no longer bound to time, so there was no reason to rush. It was at that moment that he realized his heart was thumping against his chest. Everything was going as he planned, so why was it acting like something was wrong? It didn’t feel like excitement this time.

“Satoshi,” a voice called out. Naraku turned and saw the man he watched tear up moments ago approaching him. “May I have a word?”

“I’m not going anywhere.” Naraku retorted. He took pleasure in watching the man pausing to figure out if that meant yes or no.

“Um, it’s about Misako,”

“I am aware she is absent.”

“Well, yes, but,” the man stepped closer, looking behind him nervously. Naraku’s eyes followed the path of the man’s gaze and saw his wife standing with their young son. “Did she visit you? She said she would.”

“Why would she?”

“Because she- I fear she ran away.”

“That makes no sense.” Naraku answered, but he looked down when his mind connected the dots. “Oh...you’re the father.”

The man gasped and then motioned for Naraku to keep his voice down. “You knew? She did visit you?”

“She told me.” Naraku admitted, avoiding answering the other question. “You already have a wife and child. Are they not enough?”

“What? No! That isn’t why- look,”

“Then why stray? I’m genuinely curious.” It baffled Naraku. Kikyou and Inuyasha made similar promises to each other and all it took was a moment of weak sorcery to convince them to break those promises. Why make such promises if they allowed them to be so easily ruined or better yet in this man's case, ruined it themselves?

“We...it was a moment of weakness, blurred judgment,”

“Just one moment?” Naraku held a single finger up. What he could remember from Onigumo’s demented mind, a one-time meeting between a man and woman was highly unlikely, especially if both were willing.

The man’s gaze fell to the ground. “No.”

That unsurprising answer still annoyed Naraku. These people would judge men like Onigumo for his dishonesty and depravity and then would turn around to lie to their loved ones about their own immoral acts. “How do I know that you didn’t, how should we say, escort her elsewhere to avoid backlash from your fellow villagers?”

“What? N-No, I would never-” 

“I’m certain you told your wife you would never lay with another woman.”

“Satoshi,” the man was now growing angry, which piqued Naraku’s interest. What leverage could this man possibly have now that his dirty secret was not only known by another person, but a person the entire village held in high respect?

“Tetsui,” the man’s wife called out as she approached the two men. Naraku stared Tetsui down and Tetsui stared back before his eyebrows knitted together with worry as he mouthed the word, “Please.”

 _‘This little game could be fun.’_ Naraku nodded to the man, who sighed heavily before forcing a smile and turning to his wife.

“Let’s go home. We have chores to finish.” Tetsui said to her. She smiled and bowed slightly to Naraku before walking away with her unfaithful husband.

As Naraku turned to walk back to his new home, something stirred within him. He tried to figure out what it was, where it was coming from, but his mind was foggy now and his body felt heavier. For the first time since leaving Onigumo’s body, he felt tired.

 

* * *

 

The day dragged on and Naraku’s condition worsened. Nothing seemed wrong, but his body apparently knew something he didn’t. While sitting against the wall of the healer’s small hut, he could hear the village men gathering necessities to enter the forest to search for Misako. The hut was on the outskirts of the village due to the stench of dead bodies and sickness, so Naraku really had to strain his hearing to catch what was being said. He couldn’t ignore the fact that he was hearing less as dusk approached darkness.

At first, each man had his own idea of what happened to Misako, but one theory began to spread like wildfire - the yamauba. Allegedly, she had kidnapped people from this place before and mostly targeted young women. Kikyou apparently fought this mountain hag a couple of years ago and the hag retreated before the priestess could finish her off. With Kikyou’s recent death, the villagers were becoming convinced that the yamauba had returned for her revenge.

 _‘Morons. They insist on going even though I told them it was going to be a moonless night.’_ How were they going to slay a yokai in the dark? The only thing their torches were going to do was give away their positions. Naraku was more than fine with allowing the yamauba to take credit for his actions as long as it benefitted him in the eyes of the villagers, but he didn’t wish to share his prey with her. There wasn’t much he could do to stop the men at this point, though.

_‘Kikyou...why?’_

Naraku’s teeth clenched and he held his hands into fists so tightly that the nails dug into his palms and drew blood. His heart thumped against his chest with alarm. “Where did that come from?”

_‘I never wanted her to die!’_

Another thump pounded his chest so hard that he almost fell forward. A tear escaped his eye and it took everything in Naraku’s power to not smash everything in front of him. Onigumo was dead! His body was ashes in the wind! There was _nothing left_ of him! Why was he still plagued with his thoughts and feelings?

“What...is...happening?” Naraku growled, falling forward to his hands and knees. His fingernails dug into the wooden floor and when the burning sensation engulfed him, the nails began to snap and rip off from the pressure of his inhuman strength. Now his heart was continuously hitting his chest, almost as if it wanted to break out.

_‘If I wasn’t trapped here, she would be with me!’_

“No,” Naraku grunted, shakily pushing himself into a sitting position on his knees. “She never would have been with someone like you.”

_‘I can still...save her!’_

“You’re both dead.” he told himself, the pain slowly disappearing. It took longer than he wanted to admit to regain control of his breathing and his heart was still trying to beat a hole through his chest, the burning sensation was mostly gone except from his back. His eyes caught their reflection in a mirror sitting on the floor. In the dark, they glowed a fiery red and at that moment, they showed every bit of anger he was feeling.

 _‘Why does it still hurt? Why do I feel pain?’_ Naraku stood and pulled the robe from his torso, letting it pool at his waist. He turned his back to the mirror and then looked over his shoulder.

The sight wasn’t pretty. A portion of Naraku’s flesh had burned in the center of his back. He didn’t remember brushing up against any yokai repellents and the healer had nothing in his home that could harm Naraku. No one touched him, so it couldn’t have rubbed off from any of the equipment the men were gathering to slay their yamauba. The flesh was trying to heal as quickly as it was melting. Some areas were healing, but others remained burned, and within minutes, the mark began to take a peculiar shape - a spider.

Once fully formed, the scar flashed a bright red and Naraku gasped when his chest cracked open like a snake shedding its skin. Had the heart finally broken free? His hands desperately grasped and lifted, trying to hold the torso together, to keep his insides on the inside, but soon, they split open as well as root-like tentacles began to spread across the room. His legs followed the same pattern. Within seconds, all but his head had morphed into various mounds of flesh, tentacles, and textures. He was stuck against a wall and wrapped in a cocoon of his own flesh.

 _‘Why is this...could it be?’_ Naraku was able to move, but not much. He could see the myriad of limbs and carapaces of the hundreds of yokai that created him sticking out at awkward, unhelpful angles. They moved when he willed them to, but none of them were able to move from the area they were stuck to.

The one thing that wasn’t made of yokai, the weakest part he could feel through all of his extensions, was the heart beating within his opened chest. With every pump, the yokai flesh twitched, and with every pump, Naraku could feel...regret. He could feel sorrow. He missed hearing her voice as she tried to relieve his pain.

“No,” Naraku grumbled. He shouldn’t have killed Kikyou! He could have taken the jewel and disappeared, beyond her or her hanyou’s reach! He wouldn’t have had to wait for the jewel to reappear! She would still be alive!

Hanyou.

The word he so casually used as an insult towards Inuyasha, the young man who rivaled him for use of the jewel, for Kikyou’s affection...

“NO!” Naraku refused to hear it, even if it came from his own mind.

Hanyou.

 _‘I...can’t be.’_ The product of a yokai-human union; a hanyou. Though, the definition never specified what kind of union. Even Kikyou...Naraku gagged thinking of her, of her pale, lifeless body. How could he do such a thing?   

“Hanyou.” he growled. Kikyou’s face flashed in his mind once more, smiling. “You think this is funny?”

Talking to himself and dwelling on his hatred for a dead woman wasn’t solving any of his issues. There was no denying it; despite being formed through circumstantial sorcery, he was still formed from the union of a human and yokai. That didn’t bar him from the category of being a hanyou; it simply made him an atypical hanyou.  

“My heart is his heart - absolutely disgusting!” he hissed with anger. “Will this happen no matter what body I use? Do I need a stronger body to prevent this?”

At the moment, his biggest issue was not being able to hold his body together and move around. Solving the heart problem was something that had to wait. Naraku inhaled and closed his eyes, forcing away all thoughts except those dealing with his current situation.

 _‘If my information is accurate, hanyou lose their yokai abilities once during every cycle of the moon. If I am created much differently than other hanyou, then certainly something about my, “human,” nights is unusual as well.’_ He hoped, “immobile” wasn’t that unusual something.

Next, he spent time examining every individual part of himself he could move. Some parts slithered, others twitched, some extended and distended as if breathing on their own, and it intrigued Naraku more than anything. Nothing was perfect and every individual piece was weak, but together they made him. They made something greater than they ever could be on their own. When he changed from Onigumo’s body to Satoshi’s, he absorbed everything about Satoshi, so when the yokai combined inside Onigumo’s body, he inherited everything about them. That brought an idea to the surface of his mind; could he expel parts of beings he didn’t like? He technically - and unintentionally - did it with Onigumo’s body. He threw out everything but his heart, so could he do that with others? Naraku’s gaze shifted back to a yokai part he found mostly unresponsive minutes ago.

 _‘It’s damaged.’_ Naraku tried to flex the skinny, three-clawed hand to his right. It twitched, but otherwise, wouldn’t fully follow his orders. The hand looked grotesque, even in comparison to his current appearance. It was missing chunks of meat and bone was visible. Whatever he used it for, it had run its course and was now rotting. At Naraku’s silent command, a tentacle wrapped around the wrist and with a single jerk, snapped off the hand and dropped it on the floor. 

Nothing happened. No resistance, no bleeding, and no pain. A smirk pulled on his lips. Little by little, Naraku found more imperfections and useless portions of yokai that were damaged during the fusion or from Naraku’s transformations. He removed what he didn’t like and kept what he did like and found himself feeling stronger by the end of the night despite his immobility.

 _‘Surely I can add much stronger parts. I simply need to find them.’_ Naraku thought as his body gradually pulled itself back together, taking on the form of the healer once more. _‘My aura isn’t strong enough to attract anything worth my time, though.’_

“Healer! We need your help!” a man’s voice cracked through the brisk morning air.

Naraku smirked. _‘The yamauba might serve me well.’_

 


	3. The Yamauba

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While gathering information about other yokai in the area, Naraku learns more of the mountain witch who fought the late Priestess Kikyou and lived. He sets out to find the witch and learn her secrets.

 

“Go on, child.” Naraku said, sitting down under a tree. “Tell me about other yokai around here.”

“Didn’t you learn these stories from your mother and father?” the young girl, Nariko, asked.

“I wasn’t born here.”

“Oh, right.”

“Continue,” Naraku urged softly. Many of the children of the village regarded him with adoration. Apparently, Satoshi loved children and often gave them gifts, so they were always excited to see him. Naraku was feeling less charitable, but he figured out that the kinder he appeared to them, the more information they were willing to give him, knowingly and unknowingly. It only took him a couple of weeks to weave a web of secrets with the useful children of the village. They proved to be far more reliable than their parents, smarter, and Nariko was probably who Naraku would call his favorite, if he cared enough to have one. She was old enough to remember details, but still young enough to misunderstand what they meant when pieced together. She was sentient and obedient - exactly how Naraku liked his pawns to be.

“Mmm, my dad said there is a wasp’s nest down in the valley.” Nariko announced, pointing north. “Beyond the mountain that the yamauba lives on,”

“Wasps are aggressive and their bites and stings hurt, but they aren’t yokai.”

“Oh, I know! But he said these wasps are huge!” she insisted, using her arms and hands to show Naraku how large they allegedly were. If she could be believed, these wasps were the size of an adult cat.

The frown on his face deepened. “Uninteresting. What else?”

“A tanuki was bothering a town not too far from here. Father says it’s about a day’s ride if you follow the main road, maybe two if you rest overnight. But he also said they hired a slayer to take care of it, so it might be dead already.”

“It most certainly is dead. That is what a slayer does.” Naraku responded, making another mental note of the existence of yokai slayers.

“Not these slayers. They try to find peaceful solutions first. They might have convinced it to leave.”

“Peaceful slayers, hm? That’s a bit of an oxymoron.”

“Father says these slayers are strong and skilled in their craft. He also said they’re the ones who gave Kikyou-sama the Shikon no tama.”

Naraku perked up at that piece of information. It was at that moment he realized he never really thought about where the jewel came from or how Kikyou came to possess it. “How certain is he about that?”

“Positive. Don’t you remember them staying here two years ago?”

“No.”

“Oh, well, I do.”

“I see.” Naraku relaxed his body again. “What else?”

“Ummm,” She twisted her body back and forth as she thought, her dark blue and white checkered kimono flowing and fluttering with her movements. “The trader said he heard about a hashihime in a city far, far away.”

“Far, far away isn’t helpful to me.”

“How will this help? How am I helping?” Nariko asked, plopping down in the grass in front of him. “Will this help you heal my mother?”

“If I know what is in the area, I can be better prepared.” Naraku replied.

“And my mother?”

Naraku finally opened his eyes to look at her. Nariko stared back at him, her brown eyes filled with a delightful mixture of hope and worry. With a simple, “No,” he could break her entirely. It was extremely tempting.

 _‘She is the most useful one of the bunch. Killing her mother might make her withdraw and become absolutely useless.’_ Naraku inhaled deeply before clearing his throat.

“I will do everything in my power to cure her, child. She is improving, so that is a good sign.”

“She is?” Nariko gasped, smiling wide at him.

“Yes.” he responded tiredly, looking away from her. His patience was running thin. He could act kind for only so long before his skin began to crawl and burn. “Run along, Nariko. I’m sure your father will need your help since your mother is still bedridden.”

Nariko hopped up from her knees to her feet, nodding at him with determination. “Yes!”

“Ah-ah-ah,” Naraku called out when the girl immediately bolted towards her home. She froze in place and turned to look at him. “What did we talk about?”

“We talked about using rhubarb to soothe my father’s bad back.” the girl repeated, imitating Naraku’s posture and gestures perfectly.

“Good girl.” Naraku dismissed her with a wave. Nariko took off once more. She was rather swift for her age. Many times, Naraku watched her outrun the other children while they played their games.

 _‘I might have a better shot at attracting the yamauba with Nariko as opposed to her mother.’_ Naraku noted. According to the villagers, the crone believed she could retain her youth by devouring young girls and women. That part of the story involving a young, beautiful Kikyou made perfect sense, but even a couple of years ago, Kikyou’s powers were strong. _‘How could she fail to slay the yamauba? Surely the hag cannot be that formidable.’_

With the exception of Nariko’s mother, Naraku had no other, “patients,” to take care of. It took a couple of weeks for the search parties for Misako to taper off as the villagers accepted the fact that she was gone. The searching resulted in the deaths of three men and the injuries of seven others. Most of them claimed they had a run in with the yamauba or some other yokai or dangerous animal, but even without Satoshi’s knowledge, Naraku knew the difference between yokai attacks and moronic men stumbling around in the dark, tripping over themselves and hurting themselves with their own tools. The three bodies of the men who died gave Naraku more anatomical practice, which quieted the itching need to murder another villager to do the exact same thing.

When he wasn’t experimenting, he used the spare time to plan out his invasion of the yamauba’s lair. He knew what he wanted to do, but he wasn’t sure how to go about it. He knew nothing of her lair and as much as he despised to admit it, the fact that she survived an encounter with Kikyou made him apprehensive. Either she got lucky, she was powerful, or she was cunning.

A distant rumble caught his attention and he looked up, spotting the gathering of dark clouds. He could smell the rain even from a distance. A man yelled to his fellow workers to pick up the pace so they could finish before the rain arrived. Horses snorted and neighed nervously, wishing to be sheltered from the rain, too.

_‘I suppose I can scout the area myself. I would prefer not to, but if she is only interested in young girls, then perhaps she will ignore me.’_

 

* * *

 

Once the rain began to fall, Naraku strode into the woods, paralleling the mountain path that allegedly snaked through the yamauba’s territory. Every villager and their child had their own version of the yamauba ranging from her appearance, to where she came from, to how she treated her victims, and why she was obsessed with youth. She was old, she devoured young women, she lived in a lone shack farther up the mountain, and she survived an encounter with Kikyou - those were the only consistent details between every individual’s story.

 _‘Even if I do find her, what then? I need to weaken her or catch her off guard to absorb her.’_ Naraku leaped onto a low-hanging branch and continued his ascent through the trees. He could feel Satoshi’s body hesitate and pull back out of fear of slipping, but Naraku overpowered its instincts completely. Immediately, the body moved at his command perfectly. It was one of the few annoying side-effects of possessing a healthy body, it seemed. It was conscious of what it could and could not do according to human limitations, not yokai limitations.

_'Hanyou.'_

“Shut up.” Naraku scolded himself. Yokai, hanyou - it almost didn’t matter. Both were stronger than humans.

After a little while of leaping, Naraku stopped when he found a sign on the side of the road he was following. It was made of rotted wood and he could tell in the past, it was evenly cut and smoothed, but over time, it snapped and broke away at the corners. It was nailed to a wooden post and oddly, the post wasn’t rotted wood.

 ** _‘Turn back!’_** The words were scribbled on the front hastily in red paint. The paint was still smooth and mostly intact, meaning it was also recent.

“Hm,” Naraku reached up and with his thumbnail, he scratched a small chip of the paint off, half-expecting it to be blood, but from the way it flaked off, he could tell it was truly paint.

 _‘An old sign, a new post, recent paint,’_ He stepped around it and saw another phrase painted in white on the back.

 ** _‘Shelter ahead.’_ ** Even though the paint was cracked and chipping off, the penmanship was noticeably elegant, as if someone took their time to write it.

Naraku smirked. _‘If I was a betting man, I would say she’s farther up the path.’_

Willing himself to walk steadily, Naraku stepped back into the shadowy protection of the trees and leapt onto another branch. Swiftly, he jumped from one branch to another, from one tree to another, and within minutes, he saw a lone hut sitting back off the edge of the road. It had its own path branching off from the road to its doorstep.

 _‘Huh, this isn’t what I was expecting.’_ Naraku felt his shoulders drop.

The hut was small, but it was in immaculate shape. Every piece of straw that made the roof laid flat and in place. Every wooden board that made the walls and supporting beams was perfectly measured and identical in length, width, and height. The grassy opening encircling the hut looked soft and inviting, even in the rain, and a small garden was dotted with various flowers, herbs, and wheat.

 _‘Is she not here?’_ he wondered, noticing there was no light from any fire, lantern, or candle. Then again, he didn’t need the warmth of light or fire either. The only reason he used them was to keep away any suspicions of him. _‘Perhaps she does the same.’_

He took his time to inspect every spot of the perimeter of her property he could. She was a yokai, she feasted on humans, so he had to have a special spot to dump any evidence to keep from alerting her next victims. She wouldn’t put it too far away, he suspected. It had to be well-covered, but also convenient. Yokai were capable of laziness to the point of getting themselves killed. Most of the time, the only reason humans were able to slay a yokai was because they caught it being excessively lazy.

 _‘How disappointing.’_ he thought with mild irritation. _‘This is her lair, she simply has cast an illusion spell over it, but I cannot find the source of the illusion.’_ Was she truly that powerful?

 

* * *

 

Stepping over puddles and mud, Naraku wove between the huts and shacks of the village once more. He walked the same path three times a day, making note of everything he could see and hear. Most of what he heard was typical gossip, but every now and then, he caught a piece of useful blackmail or information he could use to manipulate someone into doing something he wanted.

As he strode by the market where straw hats, kimonos, robes, and various other household necessities were sold, he spotted Tetsui, the man who impregnated Misako, fixing a broken board on the roof. Tetsui’s hammer struck the nail once, twice-

Naraku loudly cleared his throat and Tetsui harshly struck his own thumb instead of the nail.

“Oooow, ow, ow,” the man hissed, waving his hand urgently.

“I suppose it’s a good thing I’m here, Tetsui. It looks like you broke your thumb.” Naraku announced, only grinning when the other man glared at him over his shoulder.

“What do you want now?” Tetsui asked with a tired exhale.

“What do you have in terms of value?”

“I’ve already given you what I can.”

“You know, you could immediately solve this problem if you confess your infidelity to your wife.” Naraku pointed out.

“I cannot. It would hurt her too much.”

“Bullshit.” Naraku shot evenly. He cared nothing for what Tetsui gave to him, but the game was entertaining nonetheless. Watching the man’s entire body go rigid whenever he saw Naraku was amusing. Hearing him whisper a favor to his wife to get her to leave Naraku’s presence was pathetic.

 _‘He would rather suffer through all of that and more than be truthful to his wife.’_ Naraku thought wryly. _‘Promises, trust, and love are as real as I am the real Satoshi - it’s a lie, a front, and a trap.’_

“Then why don’t you tell her?” Tetsui asked accusingly.

“Watching you squirm is worth it.”

“Watching me- Satoshi, what is wrong with you? You’ve never acted like this before.”

“I wonder what Omezo would say is wrong with me.” Naraku said aloud. Then, in a soft, taunting wail, “He is cursed!”

Tetsui gasped and gripped his hammer tightly. “How dare you mock him?”

“Mock him? He was a liar just like you. Did he know what you were doing with his granddaughter?”

“N-No. No one did.”

“I’m sure he had plans to marry her off. Were you not mocking him by going behind his back?”

“No! That’s different!” Tetsui shouted, hurling his hammer at Naraku.

 _‘Oh, look, another social experiment volunteer,’_ Naraku lifted his hand and caught the hammer effortlessly, as if it was made of paper.

“Tetsui, why are you sho- oh, Satoshi-sama!” Tetsui’s wife called out cheerfully as she waved her hand over some of her merchandise from behind the sales counter. “Did you come to buy something?”

A tense moment of silence washed over them. Tetsui was panting lightly, staring wide-eyed at the healer, who caught the hammer without so much as a blink. Naraku kept a straight face, but on the inside, he was laughing.

“Tokiko, your husband has been lying to you, and keeping dark secrets from you,” Naraku began slowly, watching the sweat drip down Tetsui’s face.

_‘How far can I take this, I wonder?’_

“No, you wouldn’t-”

“Like what? What is he talking about, Tetsui?” his wife asked, walking out from behind the counter to look up at her husband.

“Don’t listen to-”

“Your husband raped Misako, impregnated her, and the day after she told me and asked me for my help, she disappeared. At first, I thought she ran away out of shame, but the more the men searched and found nothing, the more I began to suspect Tetsui.” Naraku explained strongly, keeping his eyes on Tetsui, whose mouth dropped open as his body began to tremble. “That is why he was shouting and threw his hammer at me. He wishes to silence me like he did to her.”

Tetsui stood on the edge of the roof shakily. “You lying son of a bitch! Tokiko-”

“You touched another woman? Again?” Tokiko asked him, clenching her fists.

 _‘Again?’_ Naraku refrained from flinching and held back his laughter. He wasn’t expecting this at all! From the looks of Tokiko’s face, this was a deeply hurtful revelation.

“No, I mean, yes, but-”

“You raped her? She was my friend! And you raped her!” Tokiko shouted as tears began to run down her face. “You killed her! Satoshi-sama would never lie about something like this!”

“Never!” Naraku repeated with false concern.

“No!” Tetsui wailed. “I would never!”

“Satoshi-sama,” Tokiko turned to look at Naraku, who stared back to drink in every tear that fell and every twitch of rage in her body. “My disgusting, dishonorable husband needs to be arrested!”

“I will watch him to make sure he doesn’t escape.” Naraku offered. Surprisingly, Tokiko nodded in agreement as she stormed towards the village elder’s home. He expected her to ask him to go instead.

“You,” Tetsui was shaking, filled with fear and anger. He looked like a rabid animal. “Why are you doing this?”

“You should have told her sooner.”

“You’re going to get me killed!”

“Oh?” Naraku’s eyes widened. “Will they go that far? I figured they would imprison you, force you to do hard labor,”

“You’re accusing me of killing Misako! Omezo’s granddaughter! That is a death sentence, you fucking asshole!”

“Hm,” Naraku dexterously spun the hammer around in his hand before tossing it over his head and catching it behind his back. “Maybe you will refrain from throwing hammers at people’s heads from now on.”

“Are you-” Tetsui looked completely lost, and for a moment, Naraku thought he was going to jump, but he swallowed hard instead and glared at him. “That’s what this is about?”

“Think about it for a moment; if I hadn’t caught the hammer, you very well could have killed me. Would that not also be a death sentence for you?”

“Y-Yes, but-”

“You threw away your right to live along with this hammer, as far as I’m concerned. No matter which murder you’re accused of, it results in your death. Does it matter at that point?”

Tetsui’s scream of despair and anger made Naraku exhale with relief. His death threat made him laugh and to Naraku’s delight, others heard the threat, which only made Naraku’s accusation that much more believable!

 

* * *

 

“Why did you wait so long to tell us, Satoshi?” Yoriyuki, the village’s unofficial leader, asked softly. He was old, older than Omezo was, so his voice no longer held the strength to sound threatening, but his tone said everything - suspicion. Naraku knew he had to act this out perfectly.

“I didn’t think it was Tetsui at first. I thought Misako fled because she was ashamed. When she visited me, she mentioned leaving, so I assumed that is what she did.” Naraku explained, filling his voice with concern and knitting his eyebrows together with worry. He was even able to summon some false tears, which made Tokiko stroke his arm sympathetically! Tetsui’s wife felt bad for him over her own husband? How much more ridiculous could this be?

“And when we found nothing, that’s when you suspected him?”

“Yes. I also assumed Misako would have returned by now and she never would have missed her grandfather’s funeral. She loved her family. I see now that I was wrong on all accounts and I was wrong to withhold that information.”

“Don’t blame yourself, Satoshi-sama.” Yoriyuki waved a dismissive hand at him. “Everyone’s medical relationship with you is private and I know how seriously you take that oath you make to us individually. I didn’t want to believe Tetsui could do it either.”

“Now it makes sense,” Tokiko said softly. “I told him to join the search for her, but he refused. He said his purpose was to be home with his family, but he spent most of the time avoiding us.”

 _‘This man couldn’t have set himself up to die any easier even if he tried.’_ Naraku thought incredulously. This was going much better than he anticipated. Were all humans this easy to bait and manipulate or was he simply lucky for stumbling upon them after what he did to Kikyou and Inuyasha?

“It is decided then.” Yoriyuki stood, clutching his walking stick powerfully. “Tetsui is to be executed immediately. His crimes are too horrible to wait.”

The sun was setting by the time Tetsui was brought to the center of the village, bound with rope and still crying and muttering about Satoshi being a liar. Naraku wanted to mention the sky being blood red once more and that it was a bad omen, but he knew better. Yoriyuki gave a powerful speech about how sorry he was to Misako’s family, for failing his long-time friend, Omezo, and for failing his people. He even asked for forgiveness and the people responded with forgiveness.

 _‘If I tried hard enough, I could convince these fools to worship me.’_ he thought smugly.

It was so quiet, Naraku heard the blade slice through the air before hitting flesh and bone. The light thud of the head and the harder thud of the body could have been heard to the top of the mountain.

“We should bury him at least, Satoshi.” Yoriyuki stated as the crowd began to disperse. “The last thing we need is his spirit haunting the village.”

“Yes, of course.” he answered, keeping his back turned to the man as he rolled his eyes.

The grave he dug was shallow, but it was also deep into the forest, so the smell wouldn’t affect anyone. Naraku hoped animals would track down the body and dispose of it themselves and a tiny part of him hoped Tetsui’s vengeful spirit would return to haunt the village. They deserved it.

From that spot, he descended down a nearby cliff and found a boulder three times his size. He shifted it and stared into the resting place of Misako, making sure she was still there. With the exception of normal decomposition, she hadn’t been moved since he placed her there. He didn’t want to absorb her nor did he want to burn her because the smoke would have attracted the village’s attention, so he hid her to extend the search as long as he could.

Naraku pressed his hands together in a praying gesture, smirking victoriously. “Rest peacefully now, Misako. We found your killer and brought him to justice.”

 

* * *

 

Shapeshifting was never pleasant. There were rules to it and he despised rules. The sound of bones cracking and flesh squashing and stretching didn’t bother him; the fact that he had to change into something or someone of similar size bothered him. He was Naraku, born of many, so he should have been granted the ability to change into whatever he wanted whenever he wanted. As he learned with Onigumo’s body, shapeshifting took a detrimental toll on whatever body he inhabited. Had the bandit not been near death already, his youth would have guaranteed a few more forms before falling apart.

“There,” he huffed lightly, tightening Misako’s kimono around his now-feminine waist. That was another annoyance; clothes. When he did shapeshift, he had to find clothes that would fit. Finding one of Kikyou’s spare miko outfits was simple, but finding a close-enough replacement for Inuyasha’s ridiculous bright red robes and hakama was almost as difficult as shapeshifting itself.

His ascent took much longer than it did the other day because now he had to play the part of a helpless young woman who needed a place to rest on her way back home. He couldn’t risk the yamauba seeing how strong he was. The woman’s kimono also didn’t allow for wider strides, so Naraku had to temper his patience.

_‘I have all the time in the world. There is no need to rush.’_

By the time he reached the rotted sign telling him to turn back, the sun and its light were nearly gone. He continued walking and was immediately hit with the heavy stench of decay and the muggy scent of a yokai aura.

 _‘The illusion is gone?’_ He frowned with confusion. The perfect, clean hut he found the other day was now falling apart, had several holes in the walls, and a single giant hole in the thatched roof. The soft, green grass was nonexistent and all that remained was dirt and a few bones sticking out. This time, the hut did have a light emitting from the inside, but this one had a deep blue hue.

“Hello?” Naraku called out in a gentle, young woman’s voice. “I was told there was a place to stay for the night - is this it?”

Floorboards creaked as something moved within the hut. He saw a pair of gleaming red eyes staring at him from what was left of the window.

“Oh,” another, more mature feminine voice gasped. “Look at you, you poor thing. You must be exhausted.” A hand slithered out and pulled the hanging mat aside, revealing a tall, slender form of a strikingly beautiful woman. Her hair was long, perfectly straight, and black as the night, and her skin was pale - her beauty made her look inhuman.

“I am.” Naraku responded, tensing up to hold back his excitement.

“Come on in. My home is open to weary travelers.”

“Thank you.”

“I just finished cleaning today, too.”

Naraku almost asked her if she was joking when he stepped inside. It was in worse condition than the outside. Lanterns made from bones and skin hung from the ceiling and within them, orbs of green fire floated with no wax or wick needed to keep them lit. Smeared over the walls with blood were runes and nailed to the walls in random places were straw dolls.

 _‘She’s a sorceress.’_ Naraku concluded. The dolls were those used in curses, if he remembered Kikyou’s teachings correctly.

“Where are you headed, if you don’t mind me asking?” the woman asked, pouring liquid from a filthy kettle into a chipped cup. “I hope you like tea.”

“I do.” he answered quickly, smiling. “I’m going home.”

“The little village towards the bottom of this mountain?”

“No.”

“Good. Dangerous men live in that village.” the woman’s tone turned slightly bitter. “I saw one prowling around here the other day. No doubt he was looking to rape someone. That’s all the men seem interested in doing nowadays.”

 _‘Shit! She saw me?’_ Naraku looked down at his lap for a moment after taking the cup of tea from the woman’s slender fingers.

“I’m sorry that happened. I know I’ve been told traveling alone is dangerous, but I wonder if having a man around is safe anymore.”

The woman settled down on her knees in front of Naraku. “You are right to worry. Men cannot be trusted.”

“Yes.”

“And that includes you.”

Naraku didn’t have time to react as the woman’s long black hair lashed out at him, grabbing every possible part of his body and forcing him onto his back.

_‘Damn! She’s strong!’_

“You must think I’m as dumb as you look.” the yamauba giggled. Her features were beginning to turn monstrous right before his eyes. Her teeth were fangs, her mouth was stretched wider to eat more than a normal human, her nails were falling off and growing from the bloodied nail beds were claws. “Who are you?”

“I wouldn’t worry about that,”

Her red eyes rolled and in one, swift movement, she lifted him from the floor and pinned him against the wall beside her. The hair strands restraining him snapped off from her head and rooted themselves into the wall. “I have extensive knowledge of all the yokai around this area, but I didn’t know I had a shapeshifter nearby. I could use you.”

“I don’t take orders.” Naraku told her bluntly.

She smiled widely and turned her back to him, rummaging through a box. When she turned back to him, she was wielding a folded fan. “I never said you were going to do it willingly. Do you know who I am, boy?”

“Boy?” Naraku felt simultaneously enraged, offended, and punched in the gut all at once.

_‘If only she would come a little closer! I might be able to break away and grab her!’_

“Yes, boy, because that is what you are in my eyes. I’m one of the oldest yokai across the land. You reek of impulsive youth.” Even though her appearance was less human, her voice was still that of a seductive woman. It was almost soothing.

“Keep guessing,”

“Guessing?” she scoffed, opening the fan and waving it at her face gently. She pointed a claw at one of the lanterns holding an orb of green fire. “Do you know what these are, boy?”

“Yokai flames.”

“Chochinbi.” she corrected him swiftly. “Catching the little bastards is a task, but they are incredibly useful when it comes to hunting yokai. Do you know why?”

“I can guess.”

“I’m sure you can, smart boy.” she snorted. “Humans can only see chochinbi when a yokai is nearby because the flames glow at a rate that even their weak eyes can see. Yokai, however, can see more than humans can, so when we see chochinbi, they have more of a blue hue. When a yokai gets near them, they turn this vivid green color, which is exactly what they did when you reached my property.”

He could feel the hair releasing pressure. She was distracted. He also remembered the blue light coming from the hut and felt incredibly foolish for not noticing the change when he entered. “Aren’t you a yokai?”

“They are bound to me, hence the lanterns. They would never give away my presence. Any yokai with experience knows what chochinbi are and what they do, which makes you very young.”

 _‘She isn’t wrong.’_ Naraku had to silently admit. Most of the yokai that created him weren’t terribly old and were fairly weak. Individually, their auras were so weak that they probably would never set off a chochinbi.

“Let’s see what you are made of, shapeshifter.” the yamauba swung the fan horizontally as if it was a blade.

Naraku grunted, feeling his body being torn apart. It didn’t hurt, but he was in a precarious position. Looking down, he saw that she severed him in half just below his ribcage. Small tendrils began to reach for each other from each half, latching on and quickly closing the wound as quickly as possible.

“Interesting. Your regenerative capability is impressive and guessing by your reaction, you didn’t feel an ounce of pain.” the yamauba frowned slightly, taking another step towards Naraku.

_‘One more step.’_

“That’s a skill that many yokai wish they had.” She waved her fan and slashed his arm from his shoulder. Again, the tendrils began link together. “What are you?”

“A man.” Naraku answered with a grin.

“Cute.” She cut his head from his neck, reaching out to catch his head with her hand. Right as her hand grasped his hair, tendrils from his neck shot up her arm. “You think this will-”

Naraku’s hand plunged into her chest, searching for her heart, but it wasn’t there! The yamauba let out an enraged scream, cutting his arm from his body once more and ripping it from her chest with the hand Naraku’s head was still attached to.

“Am I still cute?” he asked her.

“You’re dead!” she snarled, returning the favor and shoving her closed fan into his chest. All that did was encourage more of Naraku’s flesh to attach to her and begin trying to swallow her into his body. Opening her fan, the sorceress used her aura to summon a powerful gust of wind, blowing away the wall and Naraku’s body with it. She shook her arm free of his head and stepped outside. “I know your weakness, boy! I know what you are!”

“Oh?”

“Filthy hanyou!” The yamauba waved her fan downwards and a small tornado drilled his body into pieces. “Inexperienced hanyou! Still keeping your heart in your body?”

 _‘Hers must be nearby!’_ Naraku closed his eyes and willed all of his body to stop moving. Waving away the winds and tornado, the yamauba huffed with annoyance as she walked by his head. Silence fell over the witch’s property. When Naraku opened his eyes again, he realized he was laying in what used to be the garden. It suffered a harsher decay than the rest of the land, which made the lone red flower growing out of it look suspicious. Very suspicious. Had she kept the illusion of the perfect-paradise hut, he never would have guessed the red flower meant anything. _‘It seems fate favors me again! Grab it!’_

“NO!” she bellowed, turning around when Naraku’s hair grasped the stem of the flower.

“Anyone can do the hair trick - see?” he taunted her. With a strong yank, he plucked the flower from the ground and attached to its roots was a beating, blackened heart.

“FUCK YOU!” And with her animalistic roar, she swung her arm and threw several tornadoes towards his head. A single squeeze was all it took to bring her down and turn her tornado spell into a gentle breeze.

The next few minutes were spent literally pulling himself back together. Regeneration was his most useful asset, but it could use improvements. Once he was whole, he grabbed the yamauba by the hair and dragged her body inside to keep any yokai that sensed the fight from wanting to investigate too much. When he looked down at her, she had shriveled up into a woman so ancient, she looked mummified. He absorbed her entire body, deciding to pick apart what he didn’t like later and then absorbed her heart after plucking the flower from it and watching it crumble into ashes.

 _‘No,’_ her voice echoed within him. _‘Not like this! I will never be a part of you!’_

“What was your name, hag?” he asked her with a chuckle.

_‘Kagura.’_

“I will use you.” Naraku closed his eyes. “You will never be free from Naraku.”


	4. A New Queen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While practicing his new skills, Naraku finds himself to still be too weak in body to achieve his goals, but information is far more valuable to him. As much as Naraku prefers being alone, he realizes he needs someone expendable to gather information in the field while he strengthens himself.

_‘The hag had many interesting spells, but none of them are honed beyond basic means.’_ Naraku thought as the forested scene in the round mirror he held disappeared and reflected his face. _‘My puppets cannot leave the mountain area without falling apart. My range of control is too short.’_

A small wooden doll fashioned into a vague humanoid shape snapped cleanly in half, indicating that Naraku’s puppet fully perished. It didn’t hurt him when they deteriorated, but it usually meant an entire day’s worth of carving and preparing the spell’s ingredients was wasted. The yamauba didn’t care to leave the mountain, so she didn’t pursue a way to extend her range of influence beyond it.

 _‘How did she remove her heart from her body without dying?’_ Naraku had sifted through the yamauba’s memories, but that particular piece of information was hidden from him.

And it drove him absolutely mad.

 _‘I understand how she was able to survive her encounter with Kikyou now, but I cannot figure out how she removed her heart.’_ The witch’s memories struggled against him constantly. Her spirit eventually would succumb to his, but she never failed to fight him at every opportunity. Instead of the gentle flow of the healer’s memories, or the crashing waves of Onigumo’s, Kagura’s were single drops of rain before a storm that would never come. He would end up sitting for hours trying to piece together a few minutes worth of a memory.

Naraku stepped outside to walk around his property, making sure his barrier was holding up. It was another helpful trick he picked up from the yamauba, but it required constant upkeep. He let out a sigh as he knelt down to inspect one of the stones that emitted the barrier. The runes were faded, meaning he needed to mix more blood to rewrite them.

“Damn.” he grumbled. In the few weeks Naraku had been living in the yamauba’s hut, he slowly built a reputation. Many of the weaker yokai in the area learned of the unfortunate fates of other yokai that ventured onto the property and have been avoiding the mountain entirely. During that time, Naraku had another night in his “human” form, so he began reconstructing his body with the leftover body parts of the yokai he slayed.

A low rumble of thunder pulled his attention away from his barrier. Dark clouds were gathering west of the mountain. He didn’t smell rain on the wind nor did he see it falling from the clouds yet. With a wave of his hand, his aura snuffed out the small fire burning the discarded parts of yokai he didn’t want. If other yokai hadn’t been attracted by the stench by now, then they weren’t going to come before the storm, either.

“What a waste today was,” he said under his breath irritably. All of that energy spent on preparations and nothing worked out in his favor. “I suppose I can try the puppet again.”

 

* * *

 

A loud crack of thunder roared throughout the land and Naraku’s eyes snapped open. There was something about the sound that time that seemed...unnatural. He couldn’t explain it to himself, but he knew what he meant at the same time. Several bolts of lightning struck the same place at the edge of his barrier and Naraku’s brow furrowed. Suddenly, the lantern-bound chochinbi flickered from a bluish hue to a ripe green.

“Come,” Naraku said aloud. Appearing beside him from his shadow was another puppet. It looked exactly like the healer, whose body and identity Naraku was still using. “Greet our visitor.”

“Of course.” the puppet replied, using the same voice and tone Naraku would use. Naraku looked back at the spot the lightning struck and through the smoke, he saw more lightning streaking back and forth. His puppet stopped a short distance away and from the smoke, a black paw swiped the barrier and bounced off once it made contact. A crackling roar echoed through the mountains and a wild gust stirred. The smoke blew away and Naraku’s visitor revealed itself. It was very wolfish in appearance, except this wolf had three tails and a dragon-like head complete with sharp, pointed antlers.

“Shit.” Naraku said under his breath as Kagura’s memories began pelting his mind like hail. First, he was flying and then there was a flash. Then, he heard low chanting in a familiar feminine voice. An enraged roar shook the ground as he hurriedly ran between trees, some of which were bursting into flames. There was something heavy in his arms and on his back. The yamauba knew this beast personally.

 _‘Raiju!’_   he heard her gasp in his mind.

 _‘Kagura greatly feared this creature.’_ Naraku realized.

The beast lifted its snout, sniffing the air deeply. Small jolts of lightning shot through its black fur, which was moving as if the breeze was still ruffling it. Immediately, its lips pulled back in a snarl and a low, thunder-like growl rumbled in its throat. The lightning in its fur began to crackle wildly as the antlers gathered the energy its body was creating.

“What did you do? Why is it here?” Naraku asked hurriedly as the raiju began to stab its antlers through the barrier.

 _‘Stole.’_ The word told him everything and nothing at the same time. His fingernails dug into the skin of his palms, watching as the raiju’s head fully breached the barrier. Next, it reached up with its paw, squeezing it through the same hole and when it looked up, its piercing blue eyes spotted Naraku’s puppet.

“Move!” Naraku ordered. His puppet began to run.

The raiju lowered its head and a single bolt of lightning leapt from its antlers and struck his puppet, incinerating it entirely. The loud boom could have been heard in the lands across the sea. Behind him, he could hear the wooden carving being eaten by flames. With a violent shake of the raiju's body, Naraku’s entire barrier shattered like glass.

“Damn!” he cursed, digging deeper into his mind to wrench more information from the hag. “Stole what?”

The raiju placed its nose to the ground and sniffed, its three tails raised in alert. As it prowled around, slowly moving closer to the hut, Naraku’s eyes scanned the inside of the hut, looking at the various items. What was stolen? What would a raiju possess that was worth stealing?

_‘Power.’_

“You vague bitch,” Naraku grumbled. A crackling bark pulled his attention back to the window where the raiju was now glowing blue. Sparks danced brilliantly through its fur and a piece of broken armor flew past his head, out the window and to the raiju. More bits of armor and a rusted sword joined it and Naraku looked down when he felt a tug on his neck. The necklace held a metallic charm in a pouch that he used to mask his aura when he actively hunted yokai and it floated out in front of him, connected to him only by the string tied around his neck.

 _‘There is nothing I can do to stop or repel it. When it finds me, I am doomed.’_ Naraku gripped the charm and stuffed it under his robes. If he lost the charm, he lost his cover.

“Huh?” He tilted his head in confusion. The various plates of what he thought was armor were now fusing together and forming a ring-like structure around the raiju’s abdomen. The ring had seven spikes protruding from it and with a brilliant flash, orbs of soft, white light sat on each tip. The raiju’s blue aura disappeared and the other bits of metal it didn’t want hit the ground immediately. The beast sniffed the air one last time and Naraku figured it was searching for the thief. With a final bark, dark clouds formed under its paws and it bounded into the sky, disappearing with flash of lightning and a rumble of thunder.

A sigh of relief escaped Naraku’s lungs and the tension in his body released so suddenly that he almost fell over.

 

* * *

 

“Move closer.” Naraku muttered, tilting the round mirror in his hand in an attempt to get a better look.

The puppet stepped carefully and knelt down, staring up at a wasps’ nest the size of a hand-sized rock. Crawling in and out of it were the wasp drones and they certainly were the size little Nariko said they were when she told him about them. Even though he had watched it happen several times, he still was amazed by the fact that such large insects were able to crawl inside something so small.

 _‘It’s a portal to the real nest, no doubt.’_ Naraku also noticed that whenever drones came across each other, they would hover and the rate of their wing beats would change for a few moments before they went on with their tasks. _‘It seems they use their wings to communicate with one another.’_

With the use of his newest puppet, Naraku had found and been spying on the wasps - Kagura had called them, “Saimyosho,” - for several days. It was boring, but every once in a while, something interesting happened. Either a drone would fly back with a valuable trinket clasped in its claws, or a team of drones would take on a yokai bigger than themselves and bring it down within minutes with their venom, and only once did Naraku see the queen. She was much larger than her children and had far less patience. The one time she emerged from the nest was to retrieve an injured drone. It had been caught in the web of a large spider yokai. The queen fought off the spider and saved her drone. Since then, the drones flew in groups; an order given by their queen, no doubt, to help prevent an ambush.

 _‘They are sentient, resourceful, and together are a danger even to a large yokai, and best of all, they are obedient.’_ Naraku made his decision. The saimyosho were going to be his new puppets until he could master a higher level of spells.

Naraku closed his eyes to choose from one of his many plans to seize control of the saimyosho. Unfortunately, everything he liked about them was exactly what was difficult about approaching them at all. The spider yokai was only a problem to them because she was resistant to their venom and the threads of her acre-sized web were nearly invisible even to yokai eyes, but even then, the queen wasp was able to physically confront her with little issue.

_‘The spider is the best answer I have.’_

“Meet me at the saimyosho nest once I’m finished.” he ordered his puppet.

After grabbing a few items, Naraku left the protection of his newly-made barrier and began his descent to the bottom of the mountain. Over and over, he recited his plan to himself in his mind, changing small details to make sure every move he made was flawless. He refused to let it be a repeat of his encounter with the yamauba. This time, he was going to have the upper hand. This time, he was going to be in complete control.

Once he reached the boundary of the spider’s territory, Naraku pulled a cylindrical container from his waistband. It was made of bamboo. At one end was a string and at the other end was a thin, firm piece of leather pulled over the opening as tightly as possible. Written on the side in black ink was the word, “Onibi.” He aimed the leather end at the air in front of him and pulled the string.

A loud pop echoed through the trees and a blue fireball erupted from the container. Immediately, the flames began streaking across the trees and ground, outlining the pattern of the spider yokai’s vast web as they spread. Naraku backed away to preserve his own life. The heat of the early summer day was warmer than the heat of the flames. Also, they did not burn despite catching onto materials like normal fire, but that didn’t mean they weren’t dangerous.

“There she is.” Naraku said to himself. A cluster of onibi orbs had appeared and suddenly, the patch of what he thought were young, thin trees began to move as the spider hissed and swiped at the orbs surrounding her with her long wispy legs. With every swipe, the spider began to move slower and stumble. Finally, she fell over on her back, her eight legs folding inward towards her body as she let out a final hiss.

 _‘That was impressive.’_ He began carefully stepping, bending, twisting his body; weaving himself between the fiery strands of web. The onibi orbs had feasted on the life force of the spider yokai, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t do the same to him if he was touched by their cursed flames.

When Naraku reached the spider’s corpse, he grinned. “Now it is my turn to feast.”

 

* * *

 

The sun had set and darkness spilled throughout the land. At first, Naraku was irritated by the fact that consuming the spider and picking apart what he liked and didn’t like took him the entire day, but once he remembered that the saimyosho were inactive at night, it no longer bothered him. It worked out in his favor once again. The onibi disappeared once he left the area, realizing they had no other creature worth draining nearby.

 _‘It’s a shame I could only use them once. Though, the saimyosho nest is a portal, so using the onibi on it would have been a waste.’_ The spider yokai’s venom was superior to the saimyosho venom, so he was going to want her, too, regardless of which order he obtained their bodies. The saimyosho queen was still going to be a problem, as she held her own against the spider without her venom, but her drones were no longer a threat. Annoying, perhaps, but not a threat.

Naraku’s puppet was kneeling down behind a tree, waiting patiently for his master’s orders. Once he saw his master, he bowed his head and whispered in a low voice.

“They all returned at sunset.”

“Anything unusual?” Naraku asked, keeping his voice low, too.

“They seemed nervous about something. I assumed your assault on the spider alarmed them.”

“I imagine it did.” Naraku looked over at the round, brown nest stuck against a tree. “Wake them.”

The identical puppet nodded and quickly leaped over the bushes. He sprinted up to the nest and swatted it a couple of times before backing a large distance away from it. It only took seconds for the loud buzzing began emitting from the nest. From the sound of it, there were dozens and they were pissed.

“Take cover. I still have need of you.” Naraku told his puppet. He preferred to not have to spend another day carving and casting the puppetry spell if he could help it. The puppet nodded and ran into the darkness as Naraku stood behind the tree closest to the nest.

The buzzing became even louder as the wasps began spilling into the area around their nest. Naraku quickly glanced around the tree at them and guessed there were at least fifteen of them. Suddenly, the constant buzzing sound began to soften, and then grow louder, and soften again. Then, in groups of three, the wasps began checking around every boulder, tree, and bush in the area.

 _‘How clever.’_ Naraku mused. _‘They switched from aggressive swarming to tactical investigation without needing to be told.’_ He was liking these creatures more and more. Unfortunately, they would not listen to him in his current state and he wasn’t going to risk absorbing a drone because it could lead to him becoming enslaved to the queen due to her controlling pheromones.

When a group rounded the tree he was standing behind on both sides, Naraku reached out and grabbed one of the wasps with speed that surprised even him. Did the spider yokai grant him that speed?

“Heh, go on.” Naraku taunted the wasp in his grasp, Its wings beat the air furiously as its limbs pulled and pushed on his hand. It bit him with its pincer-like mouth and stung him over and over in the arm. The wasps all backed away from him, realizing their fellow wasp’s venom was having no effect on him.

_‘I have their attention, which means I should have hers.’_

“Call your queen.” he demanded coolly, crushing the wasp in his hand and dropping the still-twitching pieces on the ground.

Instantly, their wings began to beat simultaneously, creating a constant buzzing sound so loud that Naraku could feel the vibrations in his chest and head. It was nauseating. For a moment, he thought the ground was shaking. He could also hear hissing noises and they all hissed at the same time with the same amount of syllables.

“What?” Naraku gasped when they charged at him from all angles. When he swiped his hands, they hit nothing but air. The same happened for his feet. The wasps weren’t trying to sting him, knowing it was futile after watching their fallen brother try.

 _‘What are they doing?’_ Naraku grunted when three of them rammed into his back, causing him to stumble forward. Two more knocked into his right side, continued with his left side, and then his chest. Over and over they pelted him with their bodies, keeping him off balance, but not actually harming him.

A powerful force smashed into him while he was bent over, trying to steady himself. The tree his back struck cracked from the pressure. Naraku shook his head slightly in an attempt to fix his blurred vision. Countless limbs latched onto his clothing and when the loud buzzing sound began, he felt his body being lifted into the air. He tried to struggle free, but they already had him where they wanted him and released him.

“Shit!” Naraku shouted when one of the wasps dove towards him and when it was close him, he realized it was the queen. Her claws grabbed his arms and legs and within an instant, Naraku’s body met the ground harshly.

 _‘No! Kikyou!’_ a voice cried out in despair.

 _‘What are you?’_ another voice whimpered with disbelief.

 _‘I want to be free! Let me go!’_ a third voice screamed angrily.

In the midst of those voices were other voices - monstrous ones - with every kind of roar, snarl, and growl possible. They called out for power. They called out for revenge. They called out for the Shikon no Tama.

 _‘I just wanted to be with her.’_ Onigumo whispered.

“I...want...power!” Naraku growled between gritted teeth, trying with all his might to lift his arms. The queen was still latched onto him and had begun chewing his neck in an attempt to behead him while he lost consciousness. It was now or die. “Give me your power!”

Eight long, skinny masses sprouted from his torso and stabbed their pointed tips into the queen’s body. She hissed and flapped her wings desperately, but she was as stuck as he was. The saimyosho began their hissing chants again, simultaneously, flying around the spider legs that had trapped their queen, trying with all their might to help her break free, but it was futile. The legs began to curl inward, bringing the queen’s body closer to his. She used her legs in an attempt to push back, but several tendrils burst from his body, wrapping around hers and forcing her down into the abyss that was Naraku.

Consuming the queen wasp took a fraction of the time it took him to devour the spider yokai. Apparently, speed was the spider’s second greatest asset after potent venom. Naraku had no issue with that. He slowly stood up and glanced around at all the saimyosho drones hovering before him. The sound of their wings no longer bothered him. Their hissing noises made a great deal more of sense to him now.

_‘Ssssssssssssspider.’_

_‘Sorceressssssssss.’_

_“Ssssssshapeshifter.’_

_‘Queen.’_ one of them interjected.

 _‘Queen.’_ another joined in.

_‘Queen.’_

_‘Queen.’_

_‘Queen.’_ The saimyosho began to hover around him and a few of them sat on his shoulders, on the top of his head, and clung to his arms while still chanting, “queen.”

“What is in your nest?” Naraku asked them.

_‘Your nest.’_

_‘Queen’s nest.’_

_‘Queen’s nest, yes.’_

“My nest.” he corrected quickly. “What is in my nest?”

_‘Your eggs.’_

_‘Larva.’_

_‘Queen’s treasures.’_

_‘Your treasures.’_

Naraku inhaled deeply and rolled his eyes. _‘It seems I am going to have to teach them how to speak coherently.’_

 _‘Queen is upset!’_ One saimyosho fluttered away from his shoulder.

_‘Mad queen!’_

_‘Which of us failed you?’_

“Wait, what? No, I’m not upset.” Naraku insisted quickly, trying to avoid making his headache even worse. Adjusting to a new yokai would sometimes force his mind to rewire itself and that usually lead to unyielding headaches. Overly-loyal servants sounded like a great idea before the headache.

_‘Queen’s aura and scent smell of bloodlust. Queen mad.’_

_‘Queen is upset!’_

“I’m not your-” Naraku cut himself off. He technically was their queen now and he actually was upset with them. Lying was only going to pollute the already-strained communication pools. “I am new to this, so give me time. Now, I just want one of you to answer me; how do I enter the nest?”

 _‘Fly in like always.’_ the one sitting on his left shoulder insisted, gently flapping his wings to show Naraku.

“I don’t have those.” he said back with uncertainty. “I think.”

_‘We fly. We carry queen when queen carries too many eggs to fly.’_

“I don’t have- yes, carry me.” There was no use in trying to explain anymore.

 _‘Queen carries fragile brothers and sisters! Carry queen gently!’_ And with that command, they lifted him like they did earlier, but not with the intent to drop him. As they approached the orb-shaped nest, a black hole appeared quickly and closed as quickly after they entered. Naraku never saw it before when spying on the saimyosho, but he figured since he absorbed the queen, he could see their magic just like he could now understand their language.

Wherever the true nest was, it definitely wasn’t in the realm of the living. The air was thick, stifling, and filled with miasma. When the - no, his - wasps placed him on his feet, Naraku began to walk through the uneven tunnel. It was made of rock, but not any kind of rock he had seen before. It was smooth with an oily reflection property.

 _‘Hm, this place could be very useful in the future.’_ He hadn’t planned out every single detail of his future, but he knew that everything he wanted was going to make countless enemies out of humans and yokai alike. It was inevitable that he was going to run into something stronger than him, so he needed a place to retreat to and this nest seemed like that perfect place.

As he kept walking, he noticed smaller tunnels opening into the one he was currently walking in. He assumed the smaller ones were for the drones and this larger tunnel was for the queen.

 _‘Queen’s chamber is at the end.’_ one drone stated, pointing in front of Naraku with its claw.

“Which of you is the leader?” Naraku asked.

 _‘You.’_ they all answered simultaneously.

“I cannot be around you all the time, so which of you commands when your queen is elsewhere?”

 _‘Queen makes that decision.’_ the lone drone stated. _‘Queen usually chooses older brothers and sisters. They are more experienced.’_

“I will choose you. You have been answering my questions satisfyingly.”

_‘This one is honored.’_

“What kind of gifts do you bring to your queen?”

_‘Whatever queen asks for.’_

“Good.” Naraku said with a smirk. That meant they would fly into any situation, no matter how dangerous.

The queen’s chamber was large, but plain. It had several small tunnels leading from it in addition to the large main one. Sitting up on a ledge was a loft lined with several different furs. Carved into the wall behind the loft were honeycomb-shaped holes and inside each honeycomb sat a round, white egg.

“One of you will need to care for the eggs and larva.” Naraku announced quickly.

 _‘This one will.’_ another drone answered, quickly flying up to the loft to begin checking on the eggs.

“Hm?” Something shiny caught Naraku’s eye, so he turned to look at it. A pile of various treasures sat in the corner. He was certain that it didn’t contain anything of extreme value to him, but he could possibly use some of it as bribes. Naraku knelt down and began sifting through the pile as his curiosity burned. He pulled out a white feather that was as long as his forearm and frowned. “What is this?”

 _‘A furred feather from a winged inu-yokai.’_ the now-commander drone said, hovering in front of Naraku.

“I see." Naraku was reminded of Inuyasha, whose father had been a powerful inu-yokai. His gaze rested back on the feather. "Is it useful?”

_‘It is said that one wave of it can create a tornado that can destroy every tree and human nest in its path. It is also said it can be used only once.’_

“Is the yokai nearby?”

_‘No. Winged inu-yokai is far away to the South, near the sea.’_

Naraku placed the feather inside his robes. _‘I might be able to use this in a spell to elongate its use. Being able to destroy an entire area is extremely useful.’_

 _‘Queen especially wanted this,’_ the wasp landed on the pile and dug through the jewels and pottery until it reached a glowing pink shard. The wasp dropped it in Naraku’s hand and then landed on his shoulder. _‘It is a shard of sakigami bloom.’_

He held the translucent shard up to examine it closely. “Sakigami bloom? I don’t believe I’ve heard of it.”

_‘In a large human nest, one many times the size of the human nests around here, rests a god - a sakigami. The humans give him offerings and in return, he gives them protection.’_

“Protection with this...sakigami bloom?”

_‘Yes. A screen of light protects shard, shard naturally falls off bloom as bloom matures, so bloom has larger screen of light.’_

“A barrier?”

_‘Indestructible, it is said. This human nest remains standing even while other humans burn and kill other nests around it.’_

Naraku’s interest piqued at the word, “indestructible.” He doubted it was true, but if it was even a magnitude stronger than his current barrier, then it was worth looking into. If it was protecting an entire city from the horrors of war, then it was certainly more powerful than the barrier he inherited from the yamauba. “Do you know where this human nest is?”

_‘Yes.’_

“Do you know where to find the bloom?”

_‘No. Hidden.’_

“Gather a few of your brothers and sisters.” Naraku ordered, slowly rising to his feet. “I have a task for you.”


	5. The Forgotten Quarter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Naraku finds a city within an impenetrable barrier that is rumored to be powered by a god. Using extreme methods, he makes his way into the city and finds it to be incredibly clean, organized, and wealthy - too perfect. He does find an imperfection in the form of a burned and rotted portion of the city, however, and begins to realize that the rot runs deep.

A wild gust raced across the surface of the water, blasting everything in its path. The ocean waves were becoming choppy and aggressive and the sky was darkening as clouds gathered in response to a foul aura. Naraku sat high up on a cliff, waiting and watching as his plan slowly started moving forward. Two days prior, he strangled a homeless woman to death out of frustration because he could not find a way into the city without being expelled by the barrier protecting it. It was even protecting the poorer parts of the city. He touched it out of curiosity and was sent into a world of pain that he hadn’t experienced before, even with his stolen memories. He couldn’t fully say if it was because he wasn’t accustomed pain or if it truly was the worst pain imaginable. Regardless, his worst fear was reality - the barrier was exceptionally pure and powerful.

_‘It has awakened.’_

Screams from the trading vessel floating in the bay could be heard over the roaring of the water and wind. Eight enormous red tentacles poked through the surface of the water, wrapping around and gripping the ship in every possible way. Several loud cracking sounds echoed throughout the area. Those standing on the pier watched helplessly as the vessel and all aboard it were viciously pulled under the water. Immediately, the bay fell silent.

 _‘And now I wait.’_ Naraku shifted his weight and crossed his arms inside of his sleeves. With the aid of the barrier, the city had grown very wealthy and confident and in time, those with knowledge of yokai and spiritual powers strong enough to repel them moved to the city. Weaker yokai fled, knowing they had no chance against the barrier, but stronger, ancient yokai refused to leave the place they called home. The colossal octopus was one of those yokai and in an act of defiance against the sakigami’s presence, it went on a rampage that lasted for well over a month. Naraku didn’t know how, but the beast was eventually subdued and sealed under a small mountain that stuck out of the water just off the shore. So, he took it upon himself to release it from its prison.

Naraku rose to his feet and began walking back to the shelter he created inside a nearby cave. He almost claimed the abandoned temple that sat back from the cliff as his own, but he didn’t want to risk drawing any attention to himself.

 _‘The queen has returned!’_ a familiar buzzing noise filled Naraku’s ears as one of his saimyosho landed on his shoulder delicately.

“What did you find?” Naraku asked, lifting his arm to push aside a low-hanging branch from a tree.

_‘We found all ingredients, my queen.’_

“Good.”

_‘Did the queen accomplish the mission?’_

“I did. The Akkorokamui is awake and hungry for food and revenge. The bay will be shut off to any vessels leaving and arriving.”

_‘Can water-spider break barrier?’_

“No, I don’t imagine it can.” Naraku ducked slightly as he slipped inside the cave. The bluish glow of the few chochinbi lanterns he brought with him danced along the walls. “However, it will cut off the city’s resources from other places and it will prevent fishing in the bay, which I suspect is one of the largest sources of food for them.”

_‘Will that break barrier?’_

“It will force them to lower it.” he sat down on his mat and picked up the wooden doll he was carving. “Eventually.”

 

* * *

 

 _‘These are the smartest humans I’ve come across and I despise them for it.’_ Naraku thought with irritation. It took a couple of weeks - and another night in his human form - but the city finally ran too low on supplies and requested help from nearby villages and cities. They took it a step further and although Naraku was thwarted from entering the city once again, he had to commend them for their foresight and intelligence.

Instead of lowering the barrier for a small amount of time to allow the hundreds of wagons and people into the city, they posted monks outside of the gates and barrier to search every individual with their spiritual powers. After clearing a group, a small hole in the barrier would open, allow them in, and then the monks would search the next group.

“Damn.” he grumbled, turning around to climb down to his hideout.

 _‘Queen is angry?’_ his loyal wasp inquired, hovering down from the branch it sat on.

“I still will not be able to enter the city. They are smarter than most.”

_‘I sent brothers and sisters to search for other ways.’_

“How did you get a hold of a shard of the bloom if it’s inside?”

_‘A yokai had it. Your loyal ones forced it to drop it.’_

Naraku stopped walking immediately and looked up at his drone. “Show me where you found it.”

 _‘This way, my queen.’_ The wasp turned and flew away, darting between trees and branches.

 _‘I keep forgetting to tell them to call me by name.’_ Naraku let out a breath. It didn’t matter. As long as they were loyal to a fault towards him, whatever they called him was unimportant.

He quickly followed the wasp down the rocky, tree-covered terrain. Any human would have snapped their ankle, but Naraku was able to leap from spot to spot, almost as if he weighed nothing and could float. Satoshi’s body no longer showed fear of these movements, which gave Naraku absolute control.

 _‘This way.’_ The wasp pointed at a cracked, worn wall, rising and falling over it. With a slight bend in his knees, Naraku cleared the wall effortlessly and came to a halt when he saw a familiar sight.

“The abandoned temple?” Naraku asked aloud, looking up at the pointed top of the desecrated building.

 _‘We fought here long ago.’_ The wasp circled around a spot next to a wooden well behind the temple. Naraku walked over and knelt down, running his hand over the dead grass.

“Did it live here?” he quizzed, thinking it was some type of temple-dwelling yokai.

 _‘No. It came from well.’_ the wasp replied, hovering over the opening. _‘It was hiding.’_

 _‘The well?’_ Naraku stepped up onto the lip of the cracked and warped wood of the well and leaped down. When he landed, he could hear the buzzing of the wasp’s wings as it lowered itself to join him.

“You know,” he began exasperatedly, crossing his arms as he stared into a connected tunnel. “We are going to have to work on you sharing all of your information with me upfront.”

_‘This one is sorry.’_

“Come.” he said in a low voice. Within minutes, a clone of the healer leapt into the well with him.

“Master,” The puppet bowed its head as it knelt down.

“Both of you follow this tunnel. Report back to me when you find out what is at the end.”

Naraku returned to the cave and decided to wait for his puppet to return. He hadn’t thought of what to do even if he could enter the city. It was far more protected and prepared than he could have anticipated.

 _‘This sakigami must be strong to produce such a barrier. How does one kill a god?’_ Naraku’s teeth clenched. _‘Perhaps I can use the akkorokamui to weaken it and then intervene at the last second.’_

Hurried footsteps and a buzzing noise pulled him from his thoughts. His puppet knelt down on one knee and lowered its head. “Master, the tunnel leads to the inside of the city.”

A wicked smile ripped across Naraku’s face.

 

* * *

 

A long blue snout, eyes as brilliant as amber, and fur as white as freshly fallen snow - the image of this monkey deity was all over the city. Drapes, statues and statuettes, pieces of artwork, pottery, and even kimonos had the monkey god’s image stuck onto them. It struck Naraku as a little odd that flowers weren’t as common a decoration as the monkey god’s image, considering its name meant, “the god of bloom.”

At first, Naraku strode along the main stone road, keeping out of the way of carriages and horses. As annoying as he found humans to be, many of them did have talent with weaving, painting, or carving. It had taken him a while to finally learn how to carve a halfway-decent doll for his spells, but he currently had nothing against most of the artisans in this place. Part of him entertained the idea of possessing one of their bodies, but the other part of him wanted to work to become better on his own.

 _‘Why work for something if I can just take it? That must be some human trait I’ve inadvertently inherited.’_ he thought as he rolled his eyes. He still couldn’t figure out how Kagura was able to remove her heart from her body. It was the one memory that she kept from him, even as her essence slowly became one with Naraku. Had she not put him in such a precarious position during their first encounter, he might have kept her alive to torture her secrets from her. A sigh escaped his chest. _‘There is no reason to dwell on it. The past cannot be undone.’_

The city was alive, even on a hot, sunny day. He was used to the quiet and stillness of simpler village life, so the busy hustle of the city was new and slightly annoying. Tents were set up to block the sun, people traded and haggled with one another, and any mess made was immediately cleaned. Every building, whether it was an inn, a shop, or housing, was well-made and maintained. Even as Naraku lurked and walked, men climbed ladders to repair holes and cracks in the buildings as soon as they were discovered. Everyone was cordial to one another and helpful - it made his stomach churn. Where were the rude, selfish assholes? The thieves? Nothing was happening, even with the flow of outsiders bringing supplies to help the city survive the akkorokamui cutting off their main support flow.

“Come! Place your bets! Win more money to spend on whatever you want! Women! Drinks! Food!” an old, but fit, man shouted as people walked by. His skin was darkened by the sun and his white hair and beard were a stark contrast to it. The loud chatter of each person was forcing the man to scream so loud that his voice was cracking. He was wearing a gaudy purple kimono that appeared too big for him and was waving a closed fan in one hand and pointing behind him at a small betting table. When Naraku stopped to observe, occasional players would sit at the table to gamble, but for the most part, the humans seemed occupied by other problems. Many of them were young, carrying baskets and tools for their daily chores.

“This business with the akkorokamui is getting tiresome. Why haven’t the monks slain the beast yet?” a young man growled to an older man as slowly Naraku passed by. The younger one looked to be a teenager - fiery and stubborn - while the older man looked tired, almost as if in pain.

The older man scratched his beard. “The monks don’t believe in killing. I imagine they’re trying to figure out how their ancestors sealed it.”

“That’s stupid. Why seal it? So it can break free again in the future?”

“It can be a useful tool against invaders while our barrier protects us.”

“The Great Sakigami’s barrier.” the younger man corrected quickly.

The older man forced out a breath. “Yes, the Great Sakigami’s barrier.”

 _‘He isn’t wrong about the akkorokamui being a useful tool.’_ Naraku smirked. The octopus yokai was still rampaging in the bay, despite being released by him weeks ago. Apparently, being sealed for so long gave it endless stamina.

Naraku slipped into an alley when he heard the humming buzz of familiar wings. He glanced around to make sure no one followed before holding his arm out to allow the saimyosho to rest. Naraku noticed this saimyosho was different from the one that usually answered to him. He wasn’t sure how he knew that, but he did. “Have you found anything?”

_‘Found gems, but not from bloom. They are inside rocks shaped like monkeys that stand around.’_

“Statues.” Naraku said.

_‘Statues, yes.’_

“I’ve seen them, too. They do love their god.” he glanced around again and then turned back to his drone. “Find my puppet and relay this message to it and your fellow drones - if they find anything out of place, even if it seems unrelated, report it to me immediately.”

 _‘Yes, my queen.’_ And the wasp darted into the sky before anyone could see it.

 _‘Nothing about this place seems out of the ordinary, but I cannot shake the feeling that something is amiss.’_ The city was too clean, too perfect, too organized - the mere thought of how untouched it was bothered Naraku to his core. Every yokai part within him twitched with irritation, with the desperate need to destroy something, but Naraku suppressed the urge. Now was the time for gathering knowledge and planning. Destruction would certainly come later and, in his opinion, destruction was far more satisfying when planned out.

He spent his day listening and occasionally swiping necessary ingredients for some of his spells, hiding them away in pockets beneath his robes. A group of teenaged girls giggled and pointed at him, gasping as he approached them. Naraku almost turned to speak to them, but once he heard the words, “handsome,” and, “is he married,” being flung around, he decided not to bother.

“May the Great Sakigami bless your day, sir!” one of the girls called to him.

 _‘I had forgotten Satoshi was considered attractive. I suppose I could use that to my advantage when I need specific information.’_ Teenagers were extremely easy to fool when infatuated. Kikyou and Inuyasha proved that to be an undeniable fact.

“Fresh unagi, sir? It was delivered this morning!” a teen boy asked him, waving his hand over the eels he was cooking over a fire behind his stand.

“Is it free?” Naraku retorted.

“Unfortunately, no. If you have no money, there is an izakaya on the main road about a mile north from here. The lady there offers food, drink, and housing for no charge to travelers visiting the city.”

That seemed incredibly stupid to Naraku. “How does she stay in business?”

The boy shrugged, wiping sweat from his face with his sleeve. “Her husband, I guess.”

“Ah, I see.” Naraku turned to walk away.

“May the Great Sakigami bless your day, sir!”

 _‘When I find your Great Sakigami, may all of your remaining days be cursed.’_ Naraku thought irritably.

As the day turned to dusk, Naraku headed back to the abandoned well. He entertained the idea of moving his wares and spell ingredients into the city, to use his powers to curse people under the pretense of healing them, but he didn’t want to risk being reported to the monks. Logically, he knew staying as far away as possible while pulling strings was the best strategy, but the restless spirits within him craved blood.

_‘I suppose there is some unlucky traveler on the road whom no one will miss.’_

 

* * *

 

“Master, I have found something unusual in the city.” his puppet announced, kneeling down after entering the cave.

Naraku arched an eyebrow, but kept his eyes closed. “Go on.”

“A corner of the city - to the Northwest - is burned beyond recognition. The fire destroyed an area the size of a small village.”

“Is it recent?”

“No. It appears to be older, considering the mixture of dirt and ash and the usual wear and tear that happens to structures through years of weather changes.”

Naraku’s eyebrows raised slightly, wondering if his increasing powers also increased the sentience of his puppets. Or, maybe with each puppet he made, the next one grew stronger and smarter. This one was able to investigate and deduce almost as well as he could. His eyes opened and he stood. “Show me.”

The darkness of the night was perfect for Naraku. He was able to move as he pleased instead of forcing himself to act like a human. For a brief moment, he could remember riding a horse into a village, tossing his torch onto the thatched roof in front of him. His lips turned downward. Another memory of Onigumo had slipped through. It seemed to happen when he was pleased with something or during his human nights.

 _'There is barely anyone out here.'_ Naraku made sure to take note of the city being extremely quiet at night. Not even whorehouses appeared to be open. The only life he saw was the occasional guard carrying a lantern and weapon. Otherwise, it was almost like the city was abandoned.

“There is a curfew that the emperor of this city enforces.” his puppet said, as if able to read his mind.

 _‘With such a barrier to protect them, why have a curfew?’_ Naraku wondered, feeling a stir of excitement in his gut. Now he was certain something was going on.

The scent of ash and rot hit his nose before he could see it. His puppet was correct; an entire portion of the city was completely burned down. Even the stone roads were scorched and melted. There was no indication that any cleaning or repairs had been started.

“I know it isn’t exactly the kind of information you are looking for, but it seems odd that such a wealthy city wouldn’t clean up and rebuild this part.” the puppet pointed out, readjusting the straw hat over its head. “I overheard a few of the older humans discussing this place. They called it the, “Forgotten Quarter.” They said what happened here was an atrocity and they seemed apprehensive about mentioning it at all.”

“So, it wasn’t an accident.” Naraku stated, walking over to a heap he assumed was once a hut or shop. “Information is information. Even if you think it’s nothing, it means something to someone, and as long as it means something, it’s potentially useful. I do agree; why would a wealthy city obsessed with being clean and perfect allow such an eyesore to exist within its barrier?”

“There is something else I noticed,” the puppet continued tentatively. “Have you noticed anything about the citizens, Master?”

“I have noticed the younger humans are more religious than the elders. The elders seem to speak of peace and the younger ones continuously wish for the Great Sakigami to bless my day.” Naraku responded in a mockful tone.

“Yes, but I’ve noticed that the ages of the citizens are...unusual.”

“How so?”

“They are either very old or very young. It’s almost like grandparents with their grandchildren and great-grandchildren, but no parents; middle-aged or young.”

Naraku froze and thought for a moment. It was true! Every person he saw that day was either a teenager or aged. The ones of mixed ages were the traders visiting the city to deliver supplies, but not the citizens themselves. He quickly turned back to his puppet. “Look more into that. I imagine there are scholars in the aristocratic quarter with information on this matter. Have the saimyosho assist you.”

“Yes, Master.” And off the puppet went.

 _‘Almost two generations worth of people are nonexistent in a city this large with a well-functioning economy? That makes no sense.’_ His thoughts were racing, trying to think of a reason to be had by eliminating such a specific group of people. The only example he could think of is a conqueror subduing an area by eliminating threats, which usually meant able-bodied men who could fight were imprisoned or killed.

His feet stopped moving when he came across dozens of desecrated statues. Only one stood upright and it was headless. Naraku found himself staring at the statue unblinkingly, slowly tilting his head from one side to the other. It wasn’t as grandiose as the others lining the main streets and gathering areas of the city. Whereas those were carved from various expensive stones with even more expensive gems encrusted within them, this statue and the others were carved from plain stone with no decorative gems. Though the edges and details had been worn away from years of exposure, Naraku could still tell it was the form of a monkey. Even more interesting, the base was jagged and broken, indicating that it once was carved and stood elsewhere only to be knocked down and placed here.

_‘Why?’_

He stepped past the statue and continued walking through the mess of ash, wood, and stone. There weren’t any traces of yokai; remains or aura. As he continued walking along the charred stone road, he spotted a small doll. The fur was matted and blackened, but it was still easy to tell what it was - a monkey. The sakigami doll was portraying an entirely different monkey from the images decorating the still-living parts of the city, as was the broken statue.

 _‘Has it been so long that the humans have forgotten what it looks like? It isn’t uncommon for them to change details to what suits their interests.’_ The center of the burned quarter was the most charred and broken. It was clear that a building once stood there, but all that was left was the foundation and bits and pieces of the wall still connected to the foundation.

 _‘This must have been where the fire started. All the scorch marks radiate from here.’_ he deduced, kneeling down when he saw an off-white dome sticking out of the ash. His fingers grasped it easily and he lifted it.

"Oh?" A human skull. Judging from the size, it was once a child. It still had some of its mature teeth stuck in the jawbone underneath the juvenile teeth. Naraku rose to his feet and began kicking ash around, watching as more bits and pieces of skeletal remains began to surface. Ribs, fingers, teeth, arms - it was to the point that Naraku couldn’t keep track. What he did notice thanks to Satoshi, though, was that the skulls were mostly that of younger adults with some children mixed in. Beneath them were even more piles of remains and ash.

“It’s a mass grave.” he murmured, lightly tossing the small skull back into the pile of bones and ash. “I think I’ve found the missing generations.” He left the grave and walked towards a building that was still somewhat intact. It looked like it was once a market. The inside was well preserved in comparison to everything else.

 _‘The fire must have ended before fully engulfing it.’_ He brushed aside a cloth hanging in the doorway leading to the back room. In the back room, there was only a table pressed against the wall. On the table, fallen on its side, was a statuette. He could tell what it was from a distance - another monkey, and this one matched the discarded doll. His eyes fixated on the wall when he spotted what appeared to be writing in red.

 _‘Is it writing or just more burns? It doesn’t seem like the fire reached this part.’_ He approached the wall and ran his finger along the it. The soot cleared away, following the path he made. Naraku stepped back and with a swift wave of his arm, a gust of his aura blew away the dust and ash.

On the wall, above the table, was a crude drawing of a monkey, but this one was lanky and had an elongated snout, very much like the statues in the city and very much unlike the plump, short-snout monkey portrayed by the statuette and doll he found in the burned remains of the forgotten quarter. His eyes rested on the words written beside the drawing.

**_‘False God.’_ **


	6. The Sarugami

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After discovering the city's dark secrets, Naraku puts his cruel plans into motion. He refuses to leave the city without control of the barrier.

“Will he talk?” Naraku asked lazily, unsure of how to feel about his servants bringing a human to him as a hostage.

“I don’t see why not.” the puppet clone said with a shrug, poking the old man with a stick. The man wailed and moved away from the stick, only to stop moving when three giant wasps hovered in front of him, ready to attack.

“P-P-Please,” the old man whimpered, cringing and wringing his wrinkled hands. “Don’t hurt me!”

“I make no such promises.” Naraku replied, crossing his arms inside his dark blue sleeves as he sat down on top of a boulder to look down on the man. “Depending on the kind of tale you share with me, I might just forget to kill you.”

“I’ll tell you whatever you want!”

“Even if it endangers your precious city?”

Instantly, the old man’s fear and confusion morphed into anger. “They took everything from me! Curse them!” He spit into the dirt beside to finish the insult.

“Go on.” Naraku’s interest was piqued. Though he was sure he figured out what happened to the city, learning details never hurt.

“They killed my sons! My grandson! Burned them! All we wanted was to leave the city once it killed our benevolent sakigami, but no one wanted word to get out that he had been slain! To them, it was more important to live a lie.”

Naraku shifted his position. “I assume you mean a yokai?”

“Not just any yokai - a sarugami.” The old man’s hands were balled into fists and shaking. “It had been terrorizing the forests around our city for decades, but the sakigami’s barrier repelled him. Somehow, he found a way in, killed our god, and took his place.”

“I see. Then he ordered those who could rebel to be killed.”

“He ordered those who would remember to be killed. He spared most of the children - they were babies when it happened. He left the people too old to be a threat alive to care for them. If any of us tried to flee or tell the truth, our grandchildren would be burned along with us in the Forgotten Quarter. When we die off, he will have an entire city of devoted youth under his control.”

“What an ambitious baboon.” Naraku chuckled as the three wasps settled on his shoulders and leg. “I assume he plans on becoming a conqueror?”

“He wants to be a god.”

“He is well on his way to becoming one.” he said with a smirk, looking over at his puppet. “Let’s interrupt that, shall we?”

His puppet smirked back. “Yes, Master.”

“Old man, tell me where this false god of yours is hiding.”

“In the catacombs under the city. The sakigami resided in his temple for all to see and admire; this imposter hides under the city, in the darkness, like a coward!”

“I see.” Naraku sighed, pressing his thumb to his lips thoughtfully. “Something doesn’t add up. The monks of your city have the power to exercise him, do they not?”

“They are his creatures.” the man growled. “They don’t care as long as they are well off.”

“The emperor?”

“He’s a young man who was a toddler when this all happened. All he knows is this imposter.”

“The yokai is well-guarded, I assume?”

“Yes, but I know a way for you to get to him without a problem.”

“Oh?”

“He demands sacrifices and lately, he has been demanding them more frequently.” the man swallowed hard, his anger subsiding. “He prefers young women.”

"This again?" Naraku sighed heavily as the memory of fighting the yamauba disguised a woman resurfaced. It didn’t go very well for him. 

“Hm?”

“Nevermind.” Naraku replied. “You humans make no sense. You obey him out of fear of him killing your grandchildren, yet you willingly offer them to him as payment.”

“No, not ours,” the man said as he closed his eyes, dry-heaving slightly. “Others from nearby,”

“Your stupidity is consistent, at least.”

“A-Are you going to slay- huaaaaghh!” The old man’s body slumped to the ground pathetically. Naraku’s puppet wrenched the stick from the body’s back and looked back at Naraku expectantly.

“Find out more about their sacrificial rituals. That will be my way in.” he ordered his puppet.

“Yes, Master.” his puppet replied before dashing off into the trees.

“Let’s go.” Naraku ordered his drones. When he stood, more of the wasps appeared and grabbed onto him, pulling him into the air.

 _‘I don’t remember telling them to do this.’_ he thought irritably, but then he realized that he didn’t have to walk, and that was a good thing.

Once they reached the cave, they lightly placed Naraku down on his feet. He strode inside and sat down on his mat, crossing his legs to rest. He never slept; just rested, meditated, plotted, and occasionally, he dreamed. The darkness of his cave was a welcome sight after floating back through the early morning sunlight and the cool, moist air was pleasant in the midst of the climbing temperature of the mid-summer day.

 _‘Queen, what will you have us do now?’_ a wasp drone inquired while exiting the small, spherical hive Naraku had placed inside the cave, along with other supplies.

“My puppet is scouting for information, so all I will have you do is wait. I have others searching with him.”

 _‘Yes, wise queen.’_ And the wasp flew back into the hive without another word.

Closing his eyes, Naraku inhaled through his nose deeply. _‘So, I was correct. I’m not dealing with a god; just an opportunistic yokai that got lucky.’_ Each piece of evidence he found was circumstantial, but the old man confirmed it was a story of deceit, tragedy, and evil - a story that Naraku despised because it wasn’t created by him. _‘I won’t allow some lowly baboon to outdo me.’_

 

* * *

 

After lighting the fire, Naraku began shifting the body parts around in the fire with a stick. The parts came from weaker yokai he preyed upon. Gathering their fresh corpses in one area built up a thick aura and lighting them on fire only made the smell even more overwhelming...and irresistable.

“Shut up.” Naraku grumbled to himself, pressing his hand against his stomach. Satoshi’s body wanted to vomit, but the yokai within Naraku rustled and twitched with hunger. “I’ve already given into your blood-lust twice. I am not giving into your hunger.”

They didn’t seem to hear him or care, because they continued throwing their fits and Naraku groaned with disgust and defeat, tossing the stick onto the fire and ripping a leg from a centipede yokai’s body before walking over to the nearest tree. He sat down with his back against the trunk, biting into the leg while telling himself that it was best that he was in complete control of himself when the other yokai showed up. If that meant giving into harmless demands, so be it.

“Master, I see a dark cloud coming from the west.” his puppet announced, leaping down from the tops of the trees.

“That didn’t take long.” Naraku remarked, taking another bite from the leg. It crunched loudly enough to cause a small echo in the area.

“Do you think they will listen to you?”

“You don’t?”

“Well, you’re burning a pile of yokai bodies to attract other yokai in an attempt to strike a deal with yokai.”

“I doubt they’ll be offended.”

“But they won’t trust you.”

“I don’t trust me, either.” Naraku lowered the leg from his mouth and looked up at his puppet. “What is your point?”

“They will kill you.”

 _‘You’re becoming a little too confident.’_ Naraku thought for a moment before standing up and smirking.

“Ah, thank you for volunteering to stand in for me. Seeing as you know how this will likely turn out, I suspect you will do your absolute best to win them over.” Naraku stated, tossing the remainder of the leg to his puppet, which caught it swiftly.

“Y-Yes, Master.” it replied while bowing its head.

“I will be around.” Naraku told it, striding into the trees to find a vantage point.

The wind kicked up and suddenly, the clearing was filled with various yokai. Some were snake-like with humanoid faces showing furious expressions, others were bug-like and the size of boulders, and a few of the rest were oni.

“What is this?” one of the oni spoke up, his gurgling voice booming over the roars and growls of the others.

“An offering.” Naraku’s puppet replied, stepping forward.

“What a stupid fucking human,” another yokai hissed half with anger and half with disbelief.

“You wound me.” the puppet said with fake hurt in its voice.

“He’s got balls, I’ll give ‘em that.” another oni announced.

“Alright, human, I’ll give you a chance to speak your reasons for summoning us before tearing you apart.” the first oni, a vicious-looking green beast with two jet black horns, growled.

“You are very kind to do so.” the puppet bowed at the hips before rearing back up and smiling. “Would you be interested in raiding that city in the valley between the mountains?”

The horde of yokai all stirred and looked at one another, seemingly discussing something in an unspoken language.

“I told you he was fucking stupid.” the hissing yokai announced as the noise died down.

“Some humans are little slower than others.”

“This one’s exceptional.”

“Dibs on one of his legs.”

“It’s a nice offer, but that barrier repels even humans. None of us have a chance.” the green oni lifted his club and rested it on his shoulder.

Naraku’s puppet crossed his arms. “I can lower the barrier. What will stop you then?”

“I almost feel bad for the guy.” another yokai said with a laugh.

“Hold on,” the green oni held his clawed hand up to silence the others before stepping forward. “You fuckin’ with us?”

“Absolutely not. Why else would I call you here?” the puppet asked back.

“How? It’s said the barrier is created by a god. How do you slay a god?”

“Ha, there is no god - at least, not anymore.” The puppet paused to let that information settle before continuing. “There was once a deity called, “sakigami,” yes, but no longer. A yokai found its way into the city decades ago and slew the deity, possibly devoured him, and now he lives safely within the barrier with an entire city of humans worshipping him.”

“Mm, so if what you say is true, how will you slay him? Is he not a god now?” the snake-like demon with a humanoid face asked, slithering forward in mid-air to look the puppet in the eye.

“If the true god can be slayed, so can this imposter.”

“Why are you so interested in killing him?” the green oni asked abruptly.

The puppet shrugged. “It’s personal.”

Once again, the low growls and hisses filled the air as they discussed what to do with each other. They seemed divided down the middle with half siding with Naraku and the other half still believing him to be an imbecile.

“What is there to lose?” the puppet quizzed, stepping forward. “If I’m wrong or lying, then you all go back to your usual plans, but if I’m right-”

“Then we get the reputation of being ones to bring down the impenetrable city!” one yokai called out loudly.

The puppet sighed. “If all of you bring your entire force, you’ll raze the city to the ground before the sun rises the next day. You can keep whatever you want.”

“What human wants to kill his own?”

“Are you kidding me? Have you seen what they do to each other?” one laughed in response. “And they call us the monsters!”

The green oni slammed his club into his free hand. “So, when do you plan on lowering the barrier?”

“Tomorrow at dusk, the barrier will lower and you are free to do whatever you want.” the puppet stated.

“Fine. We’ll humor you.”

“Also, I would keep an eye on the bay and waterways if I were you. The akkorokamui seems bent on revenge, too.”

“Ha! The red beast has been kicking up quite the fuss lately!” The leader oni laughed and the rest of the horde laughed along with him. Then, he pointed his club at Naraku’s puppet. “Did you have something to do with that?”

“Of course.”

“This fucking guy!” the oni roared, erupting into laughter.

“What is your name, human?”

“Naraku.” the puppet answered before grinning. “And what makes you think I’m human?”

The horde went quiet and the beasts looked at one another again.

“Tomorrow at du-” The puppet didn’t even have time to gasp before the scythe of a large mantis yokai caught him in the shoulder, slicing him in half vertically. The two halves hit the ground before dissolving away into dust and smoke.

“Fuck me.” the green oni grunted. “Well?”

“Why not? We’ve nothing to lose.” the brown oni standing behind him replied.

“Uh, we just killed him.”

“Are you dense? It was a fucking puppet!” the brown oni shouted back.

“Whoever he is, he means business. Puppets ain’t easy.” the green oni insisted, turning back to the horde. “I’m going to do it. Got nothing else to do.”

 _‘Good.’_ Naraku stood from his spot and walked away quietly.

 

* * *

 

“How do I look?” Naraku sarcastically asked the group of five saimyosho before him. They had snuck in while the monks and guards weren’t paying attention to update Naraku on the state of the city and if yokai were gathering around the outside of the barrier.

 _‘Like a human woman.’_ the wasp he usually spoke to answered candidly. _‘More yokai showed up on route today. They are waiting.’_

“Good. Their patience will be rewarded.”

 _‘Our queen is so kind.’_ another wasp chimed in. It was difficult to refrain from correcting it.

“All of you are to wait in here and wait for my signal.” Naraku ordered with a stern, feminine voice. The wasps shrank into the hive he held in his hand before he placed it inside his white sacrificial katabira.

 _‘I cannot believe how easy this is.’_ Naraku shook his head with slight disbelief. After shapeshifting into a young woman, he walked to the temple where the monks resided and offered himself as sacrifice, citing his love and devotion for their god as his reasons. They agreed without a second thought. It was an easy day for them, but little did they know, they were sealing their fates. _‘Surely, the baboon yokai is not as foolish as them. He cannot be.’_

When it was time to be sacrificed, they bound Naraku's hands and feet and placed him inside a wooden kago along with a jar of sweet-smelling sake. Two monks carried the kago - one in front and one behind - resting the handles on their shoulders as they carried him farther into the temple. 

 _'We must be entering the catacombs.'_ Naraku assumed when he felt the kago tip forward slightly. He heard the monks chanting prayers, but they sounded bored instead of engaged in their practices. 

The musty scent of earth mixed with a stale scent of death began to permeate Naraku's senses. The kago had no windows, so he couldn't see where he was, but he had to assume they reached the burial chambers of whatever nobles were placed there. The baboon must have been paranoid if he resided in such a place instead of in the temple itself. If the old man his puppet kidnapped could be believed, the baboon gave thousands of good reasons to execute him. 

"Oooooooh," a loud, deep voice boomed. "What is this?" 

"Another sacrifice, Great One. She offered herself in hopes of gaining favor for our city. She said a horde of yokai plan on attacking us." the monk carrying the front part of the kago explained. 

"Yes, I'm aware of their presence outside the barrier. They know they cannot enter, so why are they here?" the booming voice asked in a demanding tone.

Naraku smirked. _'So, he can sense auras near the barrier.'_

"We do not know, Great One."

"Hm, bring her to me. She might know more." 

The door of the kago opened and two pairs of arms reached in and grabbed Naraku quickly, carrying him to the bottom of a set of stairs and placing him on his knees. They cut his arms and legs loose before backing away.

"Look at me, girl. Behold your beautiful, perfect god." 

Naraku looked up and it took all of his self-control to not laugh. At the top of the stairs, sitting in a throne, was the alleged, "Great One." He was bigger than a normal baboon - about the size of a man - but his belly was round and bloated, indicating a lazy lifestyle. Around his neck hung several beaded necklaces of gold, jade, and garnets and he wore matching bracelets and rings. His hakama were a rich purple color, but they seemed barely able to fit around his legs. 

"My fur is the purest and softest in all the land. Both gods and yokai alike envy it." the baboon declared, running his hand along his arm, ruffling and straightening the snow-white fur. 

"It is the most beautiful fur I've ever seen." Naraku replied as earnestly as possible. He had been practicing on making his tone sound convincing and either he had truly improved or the monkey was so full of himself that he accepted the compliment without a second thought.

"Of course it is!" The baboon then waved his hand dismissively. "Begone, both of you. Leave her here."

"Yes, Great One." The two monks replied simultaneously. One of them placed the jar of sake on a table beside some scrolls and jogged away with the kago. 

The baboon pointed at the table. "Serve it to me, girl, and tell me what you know of the yokai gathering outside the barrier."

"I do not know much, Great One. I just saw them while I was traveling here to meet you."

"Did you see any of them?" 

Naraku began gently pouring the sake into a golden sakazuki. "Some oni, nozuchi, snakes, centipedes...giant wasps." He looked up at the baboon when he mentioned the wasps. The baboon twitched and shifted uncomfortably in his throne. Naraku refrained from smirking and placed the sakazuki in the baboon's outstretched hand. 

 _'So, it was this yokai that the saimyosho fought and took the shard from.'_ He definitely was going to have to work on teaching them what, "omitting details," meant. 

"Hmph. They cannot enter the city, so I don't know why they're bothering." 

"Neither do I, Great One." he replied, descending the stairs. He sat back on his knees and began looking around for the bloom. If the shard the saimyosho took from the imposter was truly a piece of the crystal, then it was large and colorful. 

 _'I don't see anything resembling that shard here. The bloom must be elsewhere.'_  

The baboon finished his sake and grunted. "Hm, you seem rather calm, girl. Do you not understand what you agreed to?"

"I'm serving the Great One; there is no better honor." 

"If that's so, then my plan worked perfectly. Having so many of you devoted to me is useful."

_'Your great plan is your downfall.'_

"More sake, girl."

“Yes.” Naraku bowed his head and grabbed the dish and ladle, dipping more sake into the dish. When he ascended the stairs and handed it back to the baboon, Naraku whistled. Before the baboon could blink, a horde of saimyosho burst from Naraku’s robes and attached themselves to every part of the sarugami's thrashing body they could. It took a few moments, but they finally lifted him and held him still enough for Naraku to reach out and grab his neck with a clawed hand, injecting the baboon with the potent venom of the spider yokai and saimyosho queen.

“Aaaahhh! No! The cursed wasps!” the yokai shrieked.

“What is it? Is something wrong?” Naraku asked sweetly.

“Gaah! Haaah!”

“Release him.” Naraku ordered. The yokai fell down the steps, spilling out onto the floor on his back, grasping at his neck desperately.

“Does it feel like hands have wrapped tightly around your throat? Can you feel the life being choked out of you?” Naraku asked, his voice shifting from the soft feminine voice to his usual deep, masculine one.

The baboon’s mouth opened and a faint noise sounding like a whimper escaped, but he was now gargling blood.

“Hold his arms. We can’t have him scratching himself and ruining that beautiful white coat of his.” Naraku chuckled, now reverting back the form of Satoshi for what he expected to be the final time. A new body was going to be necessary soon. The wasps did as their queen commanded and pinned every limb of the imposter-god to the floor.

 _‘Our queen is victorious!’_ the saimyosho began to chant, beating their wings in sync with one another.

"Wh-Who-"

"It matters not. You grew careless." A smirk pulled on Naraku’s lips and he allowed himself to enjoy the moment. “I’m going to devour you, imposter, and when I do, you’ll be dead, but your soul will live on. You will feel me pry open your mind and drink in all of your memories, learning all of your skills and all of your mistakes. You will hear my voice until your essence submits to mine.”

“No,” he wheezed weakly.

“Yes.” Naraku replied, stepping forward and pulling a dagger from the katabira that was barely covering his now-male form. “It seems my clothes no longer fit and since you insisted that your pelt is the purest and softest in all the land, I have decided to try it out for myself. Who knows? Maybe I’ll end up actually liking it.”

 

* * *

 

Standing at the top of the temple, which even towered over the palace of the city’s emperor, Naraku cradled the crystallized bloom in his hands. Each petal shimmered between brilliant shades of green and pink. In a way, it reminded him of the way the Shikon no Tama shimmered when he possessed it for those few moments in Inuyasha’s form. Unlike the Shikon no Tama, which changed colors depending on which soul within it was winning, the crystal bloom’s colors were pure, representing their first master’s soul.

 _‘The barrier belongs to me now.’_ Naraku thought with a smirk, squeezing the bloom tightly as he injected his venom into it. He could feel the purity of the sakigami’s power try to stave him off, but through the baboon, he inherited the sakigami’s control over it and soon, the bright pinks and greens gave way to a deep, dark purple. The bloom turned so dark, it almost looked as if it was made out of the night sky itself. Naraku pressed it to his chest, feeling his muscles latch onto it and slowly pull it inside of him.

All around the city, the barrier rippled, its color slowly matching that of Naraku’s aura. Every yokai in the province was going to sense his aura and that made him grin with pleasure. He hadn’t felt this accomplished since digging his claws into Kikyou’s flesh. Deep down, something in him wondered what she would think of him if she had lived. Would she be disgusted? Slightly impressed? Or, would he be just another yokai to purify to her?

 _‘Would she regret showing mercy to Onigumo if she knew this was the outcome?’_ Naraku sighed and looked up at the sky. It was blood-red as the sun began to set. _‘It’s predicting this city’s fate.’_

Raising one hand, Naraku snapped his fingers and with a strong gust, the barrier that had been protecting the city for almost a century was gone. It had been the bane of every evil soul’s existence and now it was under the command of true evil. The baboon yokai was laughably pathetic. How a creature like that was able to slay a god was beyond Naraku. Sifting through that segment of its memories was going to be interesting. 

A symphony of screams and flames began to play into the night. The yokai Naraku met the previous day took him seriously and appeared from all directions, spilling over the city walls like a cursed flood and laying waste to everything in sight, living or not. The perfect, clean buildings began to burn and collapse to match the appearance of the Forgotten Quarter. Bodies - young and old - littered the roads and even wound up on the roofs of buildings. Many were missing limbs and heads.

“It is almost time.” Naraku said aloud. The buzzing noise of wasp wings began to add to the already-horrid noises throughout the city. “Locate every yokai in the city and lead them to me.”

 _‘Yes!’_ all the saimyosho called back. They separated into groups of three to four and spread out to follow their queen’s order.

Naraku stepped off the top of the temple and fell, landing lightly on his feet before pulling up the hood of his new pelt, giving him the appearance of the baboon yokai. The skin was still somewhat moist, but the hellish fires of the city would dry it out quickly. He took his time to examine the carnage he brought to the city, pleased that something so large and perfect was now ruined beyond saving - and it was all because of him. Something about that made him feel whole. The near-constant roiling and curdling of the yokai within him was now completely gone. They were as pleased as he was...or was he pleased because they were?

“Great Sakigami!” a voice called out hoarsely. Naraku stopped walking and turned his head, watching as a crowd of humans gathered on the road ahead of him. Many of them were young and a few were old; but all were equally fucked as far as he was concerned.

“What happened to your barrier, Great One?” a young man asked urgently. He was barely a man and still had the scrawniness of a teen.

“It is gone.” Naraku said candidly. He never thought the civilians would mistake him for their false god! It was all he could do to keep from laughing!

“Can it be restored?” a girl asked.

“Are you going to save us?” an old man added quickly.

“Please, save us!”

“Save us!”

“We don’t want to die! Save us! Please, Great One! Please, save us!”

Naraku lifted his head so they could see his grin and see the fact that their god was dead by his hands. Then, softly, he answered. “No.”

A group of flying yokai dropped in on the humans as Naraku continued walking to the center of the city where the largest statue of the baboon still stood. It was chipped in some places, and sprayed with blood, but not as destroyed as Naraku would have liked. When he reached the commons area, he lifted his hand and focused his aura into his palm. The air around him became heavy and he could feel the weight growing heavier in his hand. A blast of acidic vapors burst forth, striking the statue. Within seconds, it began to melt and wither away, as if it had been exposed to the elements for hundreds of years.

“There,” Naraku let out a breath. The head and arms of the statue fell onto the ground and began to melt the stone on contact. “It looks far more accurate to the real sakigami now.” He heard the buzzing of wings and turned his head, watching three of his wasps soar towards him urgently.

 _‘The green oni approaches with his drones!’_ they called out to him.

A smirk pulled on his lips. “Excellent.”

It took a few minutes, but the oni finally made their way into the open area. Their muscular bodies glistened with sweat and blood and almost looked stronger than the previous day. The green oni was wielding his club, the brown held an axe, the red carried a hammer, and the blue held two sickles; each weapon was warped and grotesque and caked in blood and dirt. They looked around, red-hot eyes squinting with suspicion.

The green oni held his club out, pointing at Naraku. “Are you the real one?”

“Yes.” Naraku said with a nod.

“Heh, I have to hand it to ya, what you did was impressive.”

“I’m glad we could work things out.”

“Oh yeah?” the green oni approached Naraku boldly. The saimyosho hovered in front of Naraku, but he held his hand up, insisting it was fine. Instead, they rested on his shoulders, wings twitching at the ready.

“You better watch out, Jizou. His bees might pollinate you like the delicate flower you are.” the red oni jested, keeping his hammer at the ready.

“I am the pretty one.” Jizou joked back, now standing in front of Naraku. He was almost twice his height, but Naraku wasn’t worried. For the first time, he could stand toe-to-toe with a strong yokai and know for a fact that he was going to be the victorious one.

 _‘Here they come.’_ Naraku thought when he heard the buzzing noise rising. The oni’s club sliced through the air with incredible speed, but stopped an arm’s length away from Naraku as it came into contact with his barrier. A purple light flashed as Jizou was repelled backwards from his own strength.

Jizou spat on the ground in front of Naraku. “Bah! Figures!”

“Did you honestly think you could harm me?” Naraku asked him mockingly.

“We’ve broken barriers before! Yours isn’t shit!” the red oni barked back, slamming his hammer into a stone pillar, smashing it into pieces.

 _‘They don’t realize it’s the same barrier because I defiled the purifying property.’_ Naraku realized. They were all so high on blood-lust that they weren't even giving Naraku's barrier and calmness a second thought. 

“The fuck did all these bees come from?” the brown oni shouted, waving his axe around in an attempt to kill the saimyosho. The entire force had returned and with them, the yokai trying to devour them.

“Come.” Naraku said, holding out their hive. One by one, the wasps flew into the small hive until none were left.

“You going to fight us like a warrior?” Jizou asked, holding his club at the ready.

“Absolutely not.” Naraku grinned. “Have you ever heard of kodoku?”

“Oh, you’re one of those guys who just talks his enemies to death,” the brown oni snarled, stepping forward to join his green brother.

While they threatened and insulted him, Naraku knelt down and with his acidic aura, drew a five-pointed star with different kanji on each tip. He then drew a single circle around all of it before rising. He held his hands together and locked his fingers together, leaving his two middle fingers standing and pressed against one another.

“You asshole! Stop ig-”

“Gu kojutsu!” Naraku said quickly. The star and kanji flashed red and settled into a dark purple color. A matching barrier formed a dome over the vicinity, giving off an eerie glow.

“What is this?” Jizou shouted, backing away.

“This-” Naraku began, lowering his arms. “-is kodoku.” He began to chuckle when several yokai tried to flee the area, only to be deflected by the barrier. “It’s a spell that I’ve been perfecting. It was the first one I ever used.”

“I hate spellcasters.” the red oni said in a low voice.

“Oh, then you’re going to adore me. The rules are simple; everyone is allowed in, but only one is allowed out. If you wish to escape, you must kill every other living thing inside the kodo. You also absorb their power.” he explained, pointing at the barrier. Next, he pointed at the star. “Even I’m not allowed to leave.”

The red oni looked around before a loud, croaking laughter burst from his throat. “The dumb-ass just trapped himself in here with us!”

“Oh, no, my friend, you are mistaken.” Naraku replied with a chuckle of his own, holding out his arms. “All of you are trapped in here with me!”

“Bah! I know how this shit works! You kill the spellcaster; you kill the spell! Then we all live!” Jizou shouted as he lifted his club up. His brothers and the other yokai howled with him and Naraku lowered his head to hide his smile.

 _‘I couldn’t have planned this any better.’_ he praised himself, focusing his energy to prepare. He had performed this spell once before and it just so happened to create him, though it was unintentional. Now he knew exactly what he was doing.

“Kill the bastard!” a yokai hissed as they all lunged forward. His personal barrier not only halted the horde, but momentarily paralyzed them all in mid-air. Naraku slammed his hands together, making the same gesture he made when activating the spell.

“Gu fuko!” he shouted firmly. One by one, the yokai began being pulled into his body by an invisible force. The stronger and heavier yokai dug their heels, claws, and weapons into the ground to keep from being sucked in, but the ground had been melted and weakened by Naraku’s acidic aura.

“WH-WHO ARE YOU?” Jizou bellowed after watching his blue brother disappear inside the void of Naraku’s body. Naraku began laughing and the rest of the yokai were pulled in along with Jizou. When they were gone, the wind disappeared and the kodoku barrier dissipated. The five-pointed star stopped glowing. With the exception of the crackling of flames, everything outside of Naraku had gone quiet.

But the inside had gone mad. As each yokai’s life was snuffed and assimilated into him, the anger and frustration built and hit its boiling point, but after a few minutes, it began to die down as each soul was calibrated with his own. He raised his head and looked up at the sky which had gone black, save for the crescent moon.

“I am Naraku.”


	7. The Ultimate Threat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Naraku has found a new human body to play in and starts discovering new ways to utilize his magic. His fun is interrupted by yet another moment of weakness, which convinces him to shift his immediate goal from building a new yokai body to ridding himself of his human heart. While waiting for the saimyosho to return with clues on how to go about removing his heart, Naraku is found and warned by a potentially-dangerous person to leave the area or be killed. Naraku stays and accepts the challenge.

The moonlight was so bright, it was almost a second sun - though Naraku’s keen eyes didn’t require light. He wasn’t sure why, but he felt stronger at night, so he did most of his traveling at night. It was as if every yokai that created him looked to the night for their lives, unlike humans who lived most of their lives during the day.

 _‘This place is arid.’_ The parched wind turned his mouth into a desert and though he didn’t need water, he wanted it to alleviate the annoying sensation of dry-mouth. Lifting his head, Naraku sniffed, but his nose wasn’t as keen as his eyesight, and considering the dead grass and cracked earth, no water was nearby. _‘Oh well.’_ He debated sending the saimyosho out to look for him, but he didn’t care enough to reach inside his new pelt to summon them. He was also enjoying the silence too much.

Another dry breeze scraped against his face and he turned away from it. Something inside him was stirring. The screams and roars of the angry yokai from the city had mostly subsided, so he knew it wasn’t any of them trying to escape. Much to his surprise, most of the yokai seemed to have the same goal he did, so their minds and souls melded with his nicely.

 _‘My goal.’_ Naraku continued walking. His goal was to have the ultimate body - one that didn’t require a heart. Kagura had long since disappeared within his subconscious, taking her knowledge of yokai heart-removal with her, so he was back to square one. When he discarded Satoshi’s body for a new body that belonged to a monk, he did attempt to leave his disgusting heart out, but when he removed the organ, his entire being went into a frightened frenzy. Every yokai that made him writhed and screeched. Even Naraku feared death, so he squeezed it back in.

The memory made him shudder.

As he walked, the ground beneath his feet crunched and soon, the faint scent of moisture lightly caressed his nose. The scent had a sharp, metallic odor - blood. Naraku pushed the baboon hood from his head and looked around carefully, eyes scanning every feature of the landscape. His gaze fixated on a faint glow a mile to the North. He preferred to travel to the South, but this light intrigued him enough for him to turn towards it. Now that he wasn’t scrambling to ensure his survival, he had quite a bit of free time on his hands.

Death and decay - those were the words that came to mind when Naraku finally reached the source of light. It was the site of a battlefield and from the smell and condition of the bodies, he figured the battle happened early that morning, perhaps even the previous night. Littered across the stretch of dry land were hundreds of bodies. Most were human, but many others were horses and dogs. So much blood had been spilled that the ground squished instead of crunched when Naraku stepped on it.

Two distinct insignias were sewn and painted on various flags, armor, and broken carriages - a golden lotus on a green background and a white crescent on a black background. Battles usually had multiple insignias, but if it was only two, then it was most likely an isolated fight between two families under the same daimyo.

Dancing around the bodies were the sources of the glow - flaming orbs. At first glance, chinchobi came to Naraku’s mind, but these didn’t turn green in his presence. They weren’t harmful onibi either, because they weren’t swarming him to drain his lifeforce. Plus, most onibi flames were a light blue. These flames had a deep, haunting blue color.

Whenever Naraku reached out to grasp one, it gracefully dipped and evaded his hand. _‘They are sentient.’_ he concluded after trying to grab a few others. _‘They must be the spirits of the fallen soldiers.’_

Naraku’s curiosity had been satiated and he was ready to move on. These harmless flame yokai had nothing for him. He pulled the baboon hood back over his head and turned around to head back to his original path. 

“Hm?” He instinctively flinched when something flashed in front of his face. Another flash and he turned around, coming face to face with hundreds of the blue orbs, each with what looked to be faces being shaped with the flames. It was difficult to tell. Each time he saw a feature that looked like a mouth, or eyes, it would flicker away. “If you’re looking to be saved, you’ve found the wrong person.”

The flames began darting back and forth, and around Naraku, seemingly agitated about something. A handful of them began hitting his hip. They didn’t burn nor did he catch fire, and the only sensation he was feeling was a cold energy passing through his body.

 _‘Do they want my katashiro?’_ he wondered, pulling his arm under his pelt to grasp one of the three wooden dolls he carved and bewitched before leaving the city’s vicinity. When he held the doll up, the orbs stopped moving and hovered around it calmly. _‘They seem to be attracted to the black magic imbued within it.’_

Whispering words under his breath, Naraku threw the katashiro with enough force for it to stick into the blood-soaked ground. Immediately, the flames darted after it and began to fuse with it, building a single, taller flame that stood three times Naraku’s current height. Then, the deep, dark blue color slowly shifted into a blood-red color.

 _‘It seems my magic has corrupted the lost souls.’_ Naraku saw the aura through the monk’s eyes and memories. Instinctively, the monk’s body tensed up, wanting to reach within the robes it wore to prepare a sutra of protection or containment, but Naraku kept it still.

A gust strong enough to make Naraku wince whipped around the area and soon, the bodies of the fallen soldiers began to rise. All of them marched together as one. Whichever side they fought for when they were alive no longer mattered. They all marched towards the fire and puppet, each body offering itself to the flames without hesitation. Naraku lifted his arm, covering his eyes from the bright flash. When he lowered his arm, he was met with a single yokai.

A skeleton as tall as a three-story building stood in the middle of the now-empty battlefield. Hanging off some of its bones was rotted flesh. Instead of two arms, it had six, and the skull was a partial fusion of two skulls missing some of their teeth. It’s mouth creaked as the jaw dropped open and a throaty, crackling voice that held the voices of hundreds of dead men echoed from it. “RE...VENGE!”

“I will admit, I was only curious about the light, but you now have my attention.” Naraku announced with a laugh. The skeleton leaned down and studied him with its three empty eye sockets.

“DE...DE...STROY!” it croaked as it moved past Naraku, who held his ground.

Using its extra arms, the giant skeleton crawled across the plain like a spider. Cracking sounds were all that came from it as it moved.

 _'It seems to have a destination in mind. I’ve nothing better to do and I’ve yet to use any of my katashiro in such a way.’_ He ran and jumped onto the back of the skeleton - which didn’t seem to notice or mind - and found himself excited for the outcome of this unintentional experiment.

 

* * *

 

A golden lotus was on each green flag, which were flapping in the tainted wind caused by the giant skeleton’s aura. The sentries standing atop the first wall protecting the castle were the ones who spotted the skeleton first. They had fires lit, but they refrained from firing until the skeleton was in range. As Naraku expected, the arrows didn’t deter the undead yokai. They may as well have been throwing paper at it.

 _‘That is very interesting.’_ Naraku noted, clinging to the shoulder as the skeleton reared up, carefully stepping over the huts and inns of the commoners. _‘It doesn’t wish to harm them; just the ones in the castle.’_

The skeleton simply stepped over the protective walls, walking towards the taller castle with purpose. More guards ran towards it, but it ignored them completely. One of the bony arms slapped a carriage out of its way before its jaw dropped open once more, only this time, instead of words, fire burst from its mouth, striking the middle of the castle powerfully.

 _‘How tactical.’_ Naraku thought with a smirk. Those who lived at the top - which were most likely the noble and his family - were now trapped. Those below the fire were going to be forced out of the building and directly into the skeleton’s path. _‘I shouldn’t be too surprised. Trained soldiers created this yokai, so it must have access to hundreds of war strategies.’_

A bony foot crushed three men, two hands grabbed three or four men, and the fused skulls opened their shared mouth, biting off the heads and shoulders of the men it caught. It dropped their bodies and their heads tumbled out of the opening of its bottom jaw. The skeleton yokai didn’t need to eat; it was just being cruel at that point and Naraku was entirely pleased by it.

Another group of fleeing men were scraped off the ground, another wave of terrified shrieks and praying played into the night sky, and then loud crunches echoed and were followed by silence. Eventually, the skeleton moved towards the castle, grasping at ledges to pull itself up. It took two quick movements to reach the top and one quick swipe from its three right arms to demolish the roof.

 _‘Oh my,’_ Naraku gripped his pelt with excitement and disbelief.

Sitting with his arms wrapped around a woman and young boy was who Naraku assumed to be the head noble of the castle. His rich green hakama and hitatare with gilded accents and golden lotuses made it difficult to assume otherwise.

“O-Odokuro!” the man called out in terror. He glanced down at his wife and son before slowly standing up, placing himself between them and the skeleton. “P-Please, take me and leave my wife and s-”

A single bony hand slammed down on the noble and his family, breaking through the floor into the next floor. A fit of laughter burst from Naraku as he wasn’t paying enough attention to himself to stop it.

“DEAD.” the skeleton rumbled.

“Yes, they are most certainly dead.” Naraku agreed gleefully, unable to stop smiling. “However, these nobles weren’t the only ones who ordered you to kill each other.”

“HIR...OTO...SAMA!” the skeleton replied.

“I don’t know who that is, but sure - go kill him, too.”

Whoever Hiroto-sama was, it wasn’t going to matter by the morning. The leader of the family with the crescent insignia was caught in a similar situation that his golden lotus counterpart suffered through not even an hour before. Hiroto’s castle was besieged by a vengeful, bloodthirsty skeleton yokai created by men he sent to die for him.

An arrow flew past Naraku’s head, missing him by a finger’s length and bouncing off the cheekbone of the skeleton.

“Aim for the monkey! He is its master!” a man roared, loosing another arrow at Naraku.

This time, Naraku was forced to raise his hand, catching the arrow right before it struck his head. More arrows flew past him, but none of them were quite on point like this man’s were. The skeleton yokai couldn’t have cared less, so Naraku decided to have his own fun and stepped off the giant’s shoulder.

“Who are you?” another, younger man called out as Naraku landed daintily on his feet.

“No, you should be asking what are you! No human could survive that fall!” the master archer growled, notching another arrow.

“You shouldn’t concern yourselves with me. I’m just here for some entertainment.” he replied, pressing his hand to his chest. With his other hand, he pointed at the skeleton. “That is the one that you should be concerned with. It seems it bears a grudge.”

“I’m sure you had nothing to do with it.” the archer said back, letting loose yet another arrow. Naraku caught that one, too.

“You’re almost as good as Kikyou.” He grit his teeth and refrained from showing any reaction to the archers. Why did he say such a thing? It was true, but...why?

“Kikyou?” the archer repeated with another arrow at the ready. “You dare compare me to some weak woman?”

Within an instant, Naraku lunged forward, taking the man’s final arrow to the chest and reaching out for his neck. He grabbed the archer’s wrist with his free hand, squeezing his throat mercilessly with the other.

“As much as I despise her, I refuse to allow someone as weak and pathetic as you to claim superiority over her.” Naraku’s voice was calm, but it was thick with frustration. He was frustrated with the ignorant archer, frustrated with the split second of rage he felt, and he was mostly frustrated with himself. Kikyou was dead! He killed her with a smile on his face! He allowed her to die thinking the man she loved attacked and betrayed her! He gladly insulted her memory more than anyone, so why did it matter that this random human did the same?

 _‘It’s that wretch’s damn heart again!’_ He squeezed until he heard a crunch, allowing the archer’s body to crumple to the ground.

“Wh-Why are you-” The other archer was cut short by Naraku stabbing through his chest with his hand. He fished around for a moment before wrenching his arm away with the man's heart in hand.

“How can something so fragile hold so much influence over me?” he asked through gritted teeth, turning his bloody hand in different directions to examine the heart. It looked like every other human heart he had seen up until that point. Whatever its secret was, it wasn’t something physically visible. “I must find a way to seal it.” His hand closed into a fist, squishing the heart effortlessly. He plucked the arrow from his chest and watched his blood corrode the metal tip away.

The carnage around the castle was coming to a stop. The, “odokuro,” as the humans called it, had destroyed everything it wanted to. It had no quarrel with the peasants - most of the men that created it were the fathers, sons, brothers, and husbands to the peasants - and its aura had disappeared, taking the chilled wind with it.

“DEAD.” it said, looking down at Naraku.

“Everyone around the castle appears to be dead, yes.” he answered.

The fused skull nodded once and fell to its knees, as if struck with an arrow or sword. Its jaw dropped open one last time. “PEACE.”

The yokai fell over, but was turned to dust before its body hit the ground. All that remained of it was the wooden katashiro that Naraku gave to it. The doll was burned and broken into four pieces, meaning it was useless and the magic had left it.

 _‘Peace, you say? What does one receive with peace?’_ Naraku sneered. _‘That must be another human trait. Obtaining peace is self-defeating.’_ Even someone as despicable as Onigumo wished for peace, and continued wishing well after Naraku had been created. He not only asked for yokai to possess him, but expected some semblance of peace in his final moments?

“Fuck peace.” Naraku said with a forced laugh.

 

* * *

 

Following an alluring scent of what he would describe as a mixture of despair and fear, Naraku ended up in Nakagawa. Its people called it a village, but its wealth and size could have categorized it as a city. It sat in the valley of the Kiso Mountains, had fertile land for farming, and a large, turbulent river cut through it.

Naraku stored his black magic tools and baboon pelt inside the saimyosho hive and slipped on a burnt orange kesa and donned a few pairs of matching beaded ojuzu and onenju. There were plenty of monks traveling through and staying over for a few evenings, so he would definitely fit in. He had nothing to fear, but if he was going to search for answers for his heart issue, he needed to be discreet and appear harmless.

“Iwaki has fallen?” a woman gasped, stuffing tobacco into her kiseru before lighting it. “How? They said it was impenetrable.”

“It was. It sounds like it happened from within.” another woman answered.

“My master said it was yokai.” a third woman insisted. “Hundreds of them attacked when the barrier fell.”

“What made the barrier fall?” the smoking woman pointed out.

“Maybe the sakigami died.” the third woman said back with a shrug.

“Whatever happened, it’s going to put strain on all the bigger villages and cities.” the second woman huffed. “Ours included.”

 _‘So, the word has spread.’_ Naraku thought, standing from his spot in the shade and deciding to move elsewhere. _‘Hopefully the saimyosho are having better luck than I am.’_

Compared to the city, Nakagawa was far more breathable and not having people telling him that they hoped the sakigami would bless his day was definitely a plus. The mid-summer day’s heat was even getting to Naraku, so he moved closer to the river. Many people were standing on the bridge, or crossing it, and Naraku noticed most of them were young couples of men and women. He chose a plum tree near the riverbank for his new spot of shade and sat down, crossing his legs and arms.

“I swear I will always love you.” a man said softly.

“And I will always love you.” a young woman replied.

When they kissed, Naraku’s eyes snapped open. _‘I’ve made a terrible mistake by sitting here.’_ His eyes scanned his surroundings. His hand grasped a nearby rock. The rock flew out of his hand and pelted the man’s head. Naraku crossed his arms and closed his eyes when the man shouted from surprise and pain. _‘That should solve that problem.’_

“Who- you there! Monk! Did you see who threw that rock?” the man demanded.

“My eyes are closed, so no.” Naraku replied sternly.

“Let’s just go back home.” the woman insisted, but her lover was too heated.

“No! Who threw that rock? Show yourself!”

 _‘Moron.’_ Naraku exhaled steadily. _'I should have thrown it harder.'_

After the sun’s light sank beneath the horizon, Naraku decided to walk around. The night life was calmer. The aroma of cooked fish and noodles drifted downwind and the raucous laughter of drunken men and women was mostly contained inside various izakaya and pleasure houses, so the streets were quieter. Lanterns of all colors were lit, hanging outside entrances, hanging from strings parallel to the ground, and sitting on the ground to light the path of each street.

A prickling feeling crawled up the back of Naraku’s neck. _‘Hm? Was that an aura I just sensed?’_ His eyes searched, but nothing looked out of the ordinary or even remotely dangerous. _‘Perhaps I should investigate.'_

* * *

 

A pile of putrid flesh lay melted on the forest floor. The monk's body wanted to cover its nose and flee, but Naraku stayed still. His attention was fixated on something sticking out of the flesh.

 _'An arrow.'_ It wasn't an ordinary arrow, either. It was a purification arrow meant to harm those with evil in their souls. Logically, he knew Kikyou wasn't the only existing miko, but having not seen her or any other miko allowed him to bury it all within his subconscious. Unfortunately, just like the arrow in the flesh, the existence of a miko with purifying powers was now sticking out at the forefront of his mind. 

A familiar voice that almost sounded like his whispered her name and Naraku grit his teeth so hard he was sure they would shatter. 

 _'Go away, you worthless, disgusting parasite. She loathed you almost as much as I do.'_ he growled back in his head. 

Another tingle snapped him from his thoughts. This one burned him, yet soothed the monk's body and what was left of his soul. Without hesitation, Naraku leaped into the trees, stopping when he found a spot dark enough to cover him. Even though humans had poor vision at night, he knew a miko's powers would guide her bullshit-arrow through the darkness and into his heart, but only if she knew he was there to begin with. 

 _'The charm will mask some of my aura. The rest is up to me to handle.'_ Before when the raiju appeared on the yamauba's property, the metallic charm he wore hid him perfectly. Once the beast had what it wanted, it left without a second thought. Naraku was stronger now, so the charm wasn't going to completely cover him. 

"Why do we have to do this?" a voice whined. It sounded like a young girl. 

"We cannot allow it to decay here. Its evil will soak into the ground, corrupt everything it touches, and then that will attract stronger yokai." a second voice answered. She was definitely older, though it still belonged to someone young. 

"And why can't we burn it?" the girl continued with the same whiny tone.

"That will also attract more yokai. Until I make more purification powder, burning yokai bodies is too dangerous." the woman answered knowingly. 

 _'She is experienced in her craft - perfect.'_ Naraku thought sarcastically. He peered around the trunk of the tree he was hiding behind and saw the traditional white haori and red hakama that priestesses wore. The girl accompanying the miko was dressed in a blue variation of the miko outfit, alerting everyone that she was a miko-in-training. _'The last thing my plans need is yet another miko.'_  

"It's so jiggly! Gross, gross, gross!" the girl squealed and hissed as she helped her mentor lift the dead yokai into a wooden wheelbarrow. 

"Compose yourself. You will see and touch much worse." the miko scolded gently. "Besides, we are lucky enough to have several onsen around here." 

"That's great and all, but it's the middle of summer, so hot water doesn't sound comfortable." 

"Then find a cold waterfall." 

"Too cold." 

"You will learn to appreciate it." 

The miko turned and looked in Naraku's direction and had he not known better, he would have thought she was looking right into his eyes. The monk's soul certainly thought so. It desperately wanted to be saved, but Naraku wasn't interested.

The woman stared a bit longer than he liked. Luckily, she had her hands full with the wheelbarrow, so Naraku had the advantage if anything were to happen. 

"Is something wrong?" the girl asked. 

"I thought I sensed something. I must be tired." the miko answered mildly. With one hand, she reached inside her haori and then placed her hand back on the handle. "Help me lift it." 

"Got it!" her disciple chirped. When the girl took hold of the handle, the miko tossed something behind her with her free hand, out of the sight of her young companion. 

 _'Odd.'_ Naraku noted. His instincts told him to leave, but his curiosity burned a hole through his body and he had to relieve it. 

Once the miko and her student left, Naraku approached the area cautiously. His eyes carefully scanned the ground. The instant he saw something out of place, a cloud of smoke exploded beside him and within the smoke, a blue, ghostly image of the miko he just watched stood. Her resemblance to Kikyou was striking. Naraku closed his eyes and tried to scatter the image with anything else.

"I don't know who you are or what you want, but you do not belong in this world. If you leave, you can continue this existence you think is living, but if you remain in these mountains and their valleys, I will slay you and cleanse your soul."

"How incredibly arrogant of you." he responded, knowing he would not receive an answer from the false miko. It disappeared in the same fashion it appeared - suddenly and with a cloud of smoke.

 _'A katashiro.'_  A small paper cut into a humanoid shape fell through the air, weaving back and forth like a leaf in the wind and burst into blue flames before touching the ground. A smirk pulled on his lips as his curiosity was replaced with determination.

"Hah," Naraku snorted, crossing his arms. "Two can play the puppet game." 

 


	8. Peace

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Using his newly-refined magic, Naraku targets a shrine priestess who reminds him of Kikyou. He discovers the hard way that this priestess is far less passive than Kikyou was and is equally as crafty and clever as he is. 
> 
> Meanwhile, a young Buddhist monk stumbles upon the aftermath of a fight between two powerful beings and finds evidence that further proves his thought that Kikyou's death, the horrid murders of lesser religious figures, the fall of Iwaki, and the appearance of a vengeful odokuro, are all connected.

Priestess Kimiko - that was her name. This woman resembled Kikyou both in body and personality so much that Naraku was almost convinced that he didn't actually kill Kikyou and that she relocated here and changed her name. Kimiko was the high priestess of the Kyo Shrine, which sat atop one of the several peaks of mountains that were called the Kiso Mountains. She had dozens of students varying from children to young adults and she welcomed any soul that visited the shrine.

Unless it was a yokai, of course. Or, at least, from what Naraku and his saimyosho observed. They were few and far between, but kind yokai certainly existed. Kitsune, tanuki, bakeneko, and kodama were the more common ones known to be friendly towards humans, if not just mischievous. However, not one yokai - malicious or not - tried to approach the shrine.

After observing Kimiko and the other miko for a few days to learn their habits, Naraku scouted the area to find a weak point in the surrounding barrier. Just like with Kagura's barrier, Naraku could tell there were runes or bewitched items of some sort being used to widen the barrier's diameter. Otherwise, the priestess would have needed to be stationary, using all of her energy and focus to maintain it. 

 _'This ought to work.'_ Naraku thought, holding the staff of the monk whose body he possessed. It was made of wood, except for the top, which was a bronze-plated circular shape with six rings hooked onto it. The staff had holy powers without a doubt. His palms burned at the touch, but the monk's spiritual power wasn't strong enough to harm him too much. 

Naraku skimmed along the edge of the barrier, holding the ringed end of the staff down. He scoped out a perimeter of the barrier that felt stronger than the rest, further proving his assumption that a holy item or rune was amplifying it. 

"Hm?" It was slight, but Naraku was certain he felt a pull from the staff, as if someone gave it a small tug with a single finger. He continued moving forward, gripping the staff tighter and ignoring the burning pain in his palms. 

Another pull! This time it was unmistakable. Holding the staff with a single hand, Naraku's walk turned into a jog. The rings of the staff jingled until they didn't. They pulled unnaturally towards the side of the ring angled up. When Naraku aimed it the opposite way, they pointed down. 

 _'I see it now.'_ Naraku saw the rock sticking out of the dirt. Using the staff, he dug the dirt and soil away from the rock until he spotted a rune chiseled into its now-exposed surface. He stabbed at it a few times, etching scratches onto it until the rune was ruined. Summoning his own barrier, Naraku was able to pass through Kimiko's holy barrier with little effort. _'She may resemble Kikyou, but she isn't nearly as powerful as she was.'_

"Now," he murmured to himself, running off into the thick trees and bushes. Kimiko was likely going to sense her barrier being tampered with, so Naraku was on a timed mission. He swiftly snapped sticks from the trees and pulled blades of grass from the ground, stuffing them into the pockets of his robes. 

Naraku ducked into the first cave he could find. It was cramped, preventing him from standing straight up, but he didn't need much space to complete his tasks. He sat cross-legged as he peeled and cut away at the sticks with his carving knife, chanting a spell beneath his breath. The months of carving practice were paying off now and with his newly-acquired strength, it no longer took an entire day to prepare a katashiro.

When the wood took on a humanoid shape, Naraku stuck the doll into the dirt so it would stand straight on its own and began weaving the blades of grass through the gap in its torso, creating a pattern around its neck and body. 

"With the wood and grass of this holy mountain, I make your body." Naraku said in a low voice, slowly slipping one of his beaded bracelets from his wrist. "With these onenju, I grant you this monk's form." He placed the beads around the doll's neck and then grabbed his carving knife, pressing the blade against his thumb until he saw a red line. He smeared his blood across the featureless face. "With my blood, I instill my will within you." Finally, Naraku clasped his hands together, creating a triangular shape with his fingers. 

The katashiro shuddered and pulled out of the ground, hovering in the air before him. A flash of purple briefly illuminated the cave and holding the doll was a clone of Naraku's current form of a bald, young monk dressed in orange robes. Immediately, it dropped to its hands and knees, releasing the doll and placing its face towards the dirt. 

"What will you have me do, my master?" the puppet asked in his voice. 

"I want you to find Priestess Kimiko. Speak with her, befriend her if you must, but most importantly, watch her, and wait for her guard to lower." 

"A miko? She will see through me, Master." 

"No, I don't think she will. I specifically created you with materials from the very land she protects with her barrier." Naraku responded indifferently. He wasn't entirely certain, but the memories of Kagura that he could access did inform him that the materials actually played a part in a puppet's disguise. "Besides, you have no aura, which means we can fake one. Take the monk's staff and the rest of his ridiculous beads. These have holy properties to them." Naraku pulled the necklace and remaining bracelets from himself and tossed them to the puppet, which slipped them on quickly and then grabbed the staff from the ground.  

"Shall I find her immediately?" 

"No. Wait a day or two. She is going to be on guard due to the breach in her barrier."

"Yes, Master."

"Do not return to this cave unless I tell you to." 

"Yes." 

"Go on." he ordered. "If you can find anything to strengthen your false aura, use it." The puppet bowed before crawling from the cave, taking off to do whatever until it was time to meet the priestess. 

 _'This is either going to go well or badly.'_ Naraku thought, slipping his hand into his sleeve, grabbing the saimyosho nest. Glancing around, Naraku looked for a well-hidden spot and placed the nest in the darkest part of the cave. He pressed his hand across the nest and was pulled into the the true nest. While there, Kimiko would not be able to sense him or kill him if his plans went awry. 

 

* * *

 

"Welcome!" Priestess Kimiko greeted the puppet sweetly, bowing at the hips once she was closer to him. "What brings you here to our shrine?" 

"A combination of fatigue and curiosity." the puppet replied warmly, bowing as well. "I am on a spiritual journey and I've made it my mission to visit other temples and shrines and learn about other religions."

"So, you're not recruiting?" 

"No."

"Oh, good. Between you and me, recruiters get a bit tiring. I respect all, but I expect the same in return." Kimiko explained, still smiling. Both the puppet and Naraku through the looking glass could hear the demand loud and clear. 

The puppet bowed his bald head. "Of course."

"Come, you must be famished." the priestess insisted, turning and waving her hand. "Do you not have a hat?" 

"N-No, I lost it while exercising a spirit." 

"I see. Hana!" 

The young girl Naraku saw with Kimiko several nights ago came running up. "Yes, Kimiko-sama?" 

"See to it that our guest receives a new kasa to protect his head before he leaves."

"Yes!" The girl scurried away and Kimiko huffed. 

"Please excuse the girl's bad manners. She is in-training and still young." 

"I took no offense."  

Kimiko led him around the shrine, which was average in comparison to others he had seen. The walls were white and the roof and shutters were bright red, matching the color scheme of the traditional miko robes. Stone lanterns graced the four corners of the red wooden bridge that loomed over a small pond. Beyond the pond stood a smaller building with its fusama all pushed aside to let in the breeze.

"Sit where you wish, good monk." 

"Thank you." The puppet placed the staff on the floor beside it as it sat cross-legged on the matted floor.

Kimiko lowered herself until she was sitting on her knees. "So, you said you wanted to learn about other religions?" 

"Yes. I've lived in a temple most of my life, so I don't know much outside our practices."

"And what was your name?" 

"My apologies. I am Masao." 

"Pleased to meet you. I'm Kimiko."

Naraku looked away from the looking glass sitting in his lap and gagged. His puppet was doing exactly as it was told, but the pleasantries and small talk were enough to make him feel ill. Now he was struggling between checking in on them later or gritting his teeth and sitting through it all. 

 _'Queen is angry?'_   his lead saimyosho inquired, now hovering before him. 

"I'm certainly not happy." Naraku replied, placing the mirror away from him as far as his reach would allow. 

' _What would make queen happy?'_

"Figuring out how to get rid of this human heart problem of mine without killing myself would be a start." 

_'Would queen like for us to search more?'_

Naraku closed his eyes and crossed his arms, preparing himself to rest. "Go ahead; knock yourself out." he grumbled. When he heard several thuds, he opened his eyes and saw a handful of saimyosho laying on the ground, their legs and wings twitching in pain. Naraku exhaled loudly and impatiently. "I didn't mean it literally."

 

* * *

 

 _'I never thought I would grow tired of my own game.'_ Naraku thought wryly, pulling the snow-white baboon pelt over his shoulders. He pulled the face over his, slipped the saimyosho hive inside the pelt, and slipped out of the narrow opening of the cave. 

Days had passed since he sent his puppet out on its mission. It was probably closer to a couple of weeks when he gave it more thought, but ultimately, it didn't matter. In that time, the puppet gained the trust and friendship of Kimiko by using the very cunning nature given to it by its creator. It was technically doing what it was told, but the more Naraku observed, the less he liked how closely it was following orders, especially the, "befriend her," part. Through the mirror, Naraku saw multiple chances the puppet could have ended her, but it didn't. Mercy wasn't an attribute given to it by Naraku, so now he was simultaneously curious how the puppet gained some semblance of autonomy and agitated that his plans were nudged off their path. 

 _'Just treat it as a learning opportunity.'_ he told himself, stepping over a decaying branch. 

Venturing out into the open, even at night, wasn't the wisest decision, but neither was stewing in his own irritation while nothing continued to happen on the outside. Just as he experienced before, the longer he went without doing something - killing, plotting, reconstructing his body - the more he itched and burned from the inside to the outside until it nearly drove him mad. If he ever reached the pinnacle of that madness, Naraku was sure he would do something incredibly impulsive and thoughtless and inadvertently cause his demise. 

"Come to me, puppet." Naraku said in a low voice, leaping on top of a large, weathered boulder. Slipping a hand inside his pelt, he grasped the hive and pulled it out, summoning three wasps. "Quickly scout the area. I will have no unwanted visitors." The wasps broke off in three separate directions without hesitation. He slowly sat and waited silently. 

It took a bit longer for the puppet to respond than he liked, which further vexed Naraku. Was there a chance it told Kimiko about him? She already vaguely knew of his existence when she first confronted him with her own puppet, but did she find out even more? Was she aware the puppet was a puppet and was just using it against him? That thought made his blood begin pumping.

"Yes, Master?" the puppet called out, running up to the boulder and dropping to a knee. 

"You are disappointing me." Naraku told it. 

"I am doing what you told me to do. Is there something different you want me to try?"

 _'There is a hint of insolence in this one. It is lost to me.'_ Even the slightest waver of loyalty could mean his death. He had no patience for anything resembling mercy.

"Why didn't you kill her when you had the chance?" Naraku asked slowly, using every ounce of control he had to keep himself sitting. His index finger began tapping a steady, harsh beat on his knee to give him some sort of release. 

"I...don't know." the puppet replied. 

"Oh, I think you do." Naraku straightened his posture. "Why?" 

"She is nice to me, Master." 

Naraku felt a flash of rage burst through his body, but again, he held still. "Is she now?" he asked through gritted teeth. The buzzing of the saimyosho became frenzied as they sensed their master's anger. Since when did puppets care about how they were treated? Did he do something wrong when casting the spell? 

 _'Could it be because I used materials under her protection to create it? Would that give it a natural affinity towards her despite me creating it?'_ It made about as much sense as any other strange thing he encountered and didn't think was possible before. That was the downfall of magic; there was always a catch.  

"She even embraced m-" 

The puppet was cut off as Naraku swung his arm and sliced it in half with a scythe-like extension. His arm returned to normal when he pulled it back towards his body. The remains of the puppet turned to two piles of dust. 

 _'She embraced it? And it liked it?'_ He opened his mouth and instead of screaming, he let out a loud, slow exhale. 

"Ridiculous." he grumbled, rising to his feet. "I will just have to deal with her myself.

 

* * *

 

The sun was just peeking over the Kiso Mountains when Kimiko finally left the protection of her temple and fellow miko. Wearing the metallic charm to dim his aura, Naraku did everything in his power to keep his presence as weak as possible. He hid within the trees at the perfect distance to watch her, but also to be able to dodge any purification arrows fired his way. He also spent the night pacing and scouting the area, memorizing what he could about the landscape. Miko were dangerous, but arrows were less problematic when trees and uneven terrain were involved. 

"Have you seen Masao?" Kimiko asked every miko she came across. They all shook their heads. The head priestess walked back into the temple and within minutes, she reappeared, descending the stairs while armed with a bow and arrows. 

Naraku rose from his squatting position on a branch and squinted his eyes, trying to count how many arrows she possessed. It looked to be about ten, give or take. When she turned to speak to another priestess, Naraku was able to look at her bow, which hung over her shoulder. It was made of a milky-white wood and it wasn't very long, making Naraku frown slightly.

 _'A shortbow is going to pose more problems. I was betting on her bringing a longbow.'_ He slinked down from one branch to another. Shortbows shot faster and were better equipped for tight spaces. She wouldn't need to stand still to shoot nor would she need to use every ounce of her strength to draw the arrow back, saving her some stamina. _'Oh well. This should be fun nevertheless.'_  

Using small bursts of his aura, Naraku strode farther back into the forest. He wanted to lure her into the areas mostly untouched by humans. Once he reached an area he liked, he pressed against a tree large enough to shield him. It took her a while, but she finally caught up and kept her distance. 

"You must not have taken my first warning seriously." Kimiko stated evenly. 

"I took it as a serious challenge." Naraku replied, peering around the tree and nearly flinching. She was sitting!

"I must admit, your puppet fooled me at first, but you made the mistake of using my home against me. However, you've gone through a lot of trouble to get my attention. I'm flattered."

"You're welcome." 

"Why don't you come out of hiding? I think we can solve this civilly." Kimiko offered while still sitting, which made Naraku clench his teeth with irritation. Was she taunting him?

"I think not." he responded quickly. 

"You seem particularly focused on me. Is there something I have that you want?" 

"Your life." 

"Ha!" Kimiko forced a laugh and shook her head, but still made no moves to stand or grab her bow. "I can sense the turmoil within you. Your tempestuous aura tells all - you're miserable, uncertain, lustful-" 

Naraku's nails dug into the tree he was pressed against. _'Lustful?'_

"I know what you really want from me, spirit." she continued calmly. "I can offer you something better, though." 

He snorted and rolled his eyes. "I've no idea what you're going on about, but I will admit, I'm intrigued by your offer."

"Will you hear me out?" 

"Humor me." 

"Peace." 

Naraku's mouth opened, but nothing came out. Was she serious? Him? At peace? Never. 

"I can purge all of that turmoil from your soul. You will be able to pass on to the afterlife without regret." 

Sighing dramatically and loudly so she could hear him, Naraku peered around the tree again. "How boring. You bore me." 

"Apparently not. You've been watching me closely for a while and you haven't stopped talking to me yet."

"Eager to die?" 

"Again, you're projecting yourself onto me." Kimiko swiftly stood with her bowstring drawn, an arrow aimed directly at Naraku's position. "Did you think I didn't know where you were?" 

"It's a good thing this tree is in your way." Naraku said back, bending his knees and preparing himself to move. 

"I'm an excellent shot." 

"So was Priestess Kikyou." he retorted with a chuckle. "She missed and paid the ultimate price for it; are you willing to flip that coin with me?" 

A tense moment of silence appeared. A wind rustled through the trees, branches groaning from the movement. Naraku was certain he heard her gasp.

"You lie!" she replied, her gentle voice gaining a harsh edge. "Priestess Kikyou shot the treacherous hanyou through the heart with her last breath! Pinned him to a tree for betraying her!" 

"You're partially correct; Kikyou did shoot a hanyou through the heart, pinning him to a tree." Naraku glanced around, deciding on what to do next. He had her attention, and now he had her growing fury, so all he had to do was wear her stamina down, and burn through her arrows. "If you were to ask the hanyou his version, he would tell you that he was innocently waiting for his beloved priestess only to barely dodge arrows shot at him by said priestess, who then threatened his life."

Kimiko loosed her first arrow, missing his nose by a finger's length. "He is a liar, too! Yokai and hanyou have trouble telling the truth, as you've demonstrated!"

While she drew her next arrow, Naraku ran to another tree with a trunk large enough to conceal him. "How many do you have left? Eight? Nine?" 

"Don't worry, vile spirit! I have enough to end your misery!" Kimiko shouted back strongly. Naraku was sure that had anyone else been nearby, they would have said she sounded heroic. To him, she sounded stubborn. He glanced back and could no longer see her, so he resorted to using his nose. 

 _'Damn. She's downwind.'_ Naraku realized when he could only recognize her nearby presence and not pinpoint her exact whereabouts. Luckily, his hearing was sharp, because he was able to hear the thrum of the string, ducking as he spun around to the other side of the tree. The arrow stuck firmly into the tree behind him. 

"Heh, not bad!" He forced out a laugh. He needed to keep her talking to break her focus! 

"Kikyou-sama may have been born with the powers of a god, but someone had to teach her how to use them!" Kimiko hollered. "Someone had to teach her how to shoot an arrow! Someone had to teach her how to channel her purity through her veins so she could remain untainted by the Shikon no Tama!"

 _'Is she insinuating that she taught Kikyou? Absolutely ridiculous!'_ Naraku lifted his head, sniffing the air, but she had escaped downwind again, which made his blood boil. 

"Damn." It was either follow her and hopefully disrupt her preparations or wait and allow her to come at him with everything she had. He gnashed his teeth to keep from giving any audible signs of irritation. Naraku leaped upwards, landing on a thick branch and advancing downwind swiftly. Having the high-ground made him feel slightly more confident. Ranged weapons were hindered in thick forests and when they were below their target. 

"Return from where you came, vile spirit!" Kimiko ordered, firing another arrow at Naraku. Swiftly, he grabbed the branch he landed on and rolled forward, hanging off it. The arrow stuck into the top of the branch right between his hands. She had the same idea he had, apparently. 

"I think I'll stay! And I'll turn your temple into my personal whorehouse, seeing as I'm so lustful!" He turned and watched Kimiko gracefully running along the branches. This was her home, her forest, and she was making sure he knew it. Naraku released the branch he was clinging to and dropped to the forest floor.

"You sound bothered!" she shot back, taking cover behind a tree. "Did I hit a nerve?" 

 _'I need to be more aggressive.'_ He decided, raising both hands. _'I can't allow her to breathe.'_ He swung his arms outward, transforming them into elongated scythes. Several trees fell, filling the forest with loud crashing noises and a cloud of dust. It was clear that she moved before he attacked, but a familiar and wonderful scent caressed his nose and drew him towards the branches of the fallen tree. A few smears of red along the leaves and branches made his heart flutter. _'She's injured.'_  

The blood made it easier to track her scent and pinpoint her position, downwind or not, so Naraku charged forward, weaving in and out of trees like a needle and thread through a piece of fabric. He had to admit, the woman moved quick despite being human. A white sleeve caught his eye and the stronger scent of blood radiating from it confirmed it and he leaped at her, swiping through the tree in two places in hopes of cutting her into pieces to end it all. As soon as his scythes touched the sides of the tree, a hot, stinging pain shot through his arms and to his body, causing him to gasp with shock. 

 _'What is this?'_ Naraku began to panic when he realized he couldn't move. Through the ringing in his ears, he heard a rustle and the sound of grinding as a string was pulled to its capacity. 

"Shit!" he spat, using every ounce of strength in him to summon his barrier. As he hoped, the barrier and arrow cancelled each other out, but he only seemed to prolong the inevitable. Her spiritual powers purified his barrier, so it was going to be a while before it recovered and he didn't have that long to spare.

"I doubt you can do that again." Her strong, feminine voice infuriated and soothed him at the same time.

 _'The hive...the saimyosho...can they not hear me?'_ The hive was inside his baboon pelt, right against his hip. His hand was close. Naraku grit his teeth when he heard the string being pulled as the shaft of the arrow scraped against the bow. _'This is it.'_ With that thought, he felt the hive begin vibrating and the faint noise of buzzing wings.

"Close your eyes, think of something that pleases you, and go far away insi-" She couldn't finish her sentence because she suddenly had dozens of giant wasps in her face. 

 _'Queen is injured!'_ The lead saimyosho announced. 

"D-Distract her!" Naraku snarled, noticing the pain greatly subsided right when she lost sight of him. 

 _'Surround her!'_   

A bright flash of light illuminated the forest and Naraku felt absolute relief from the burning pain.

"Finally," he breathed, regaining the ability to move again. He stood up swiftly and with the exception of feeling exhausted, he no longer felt any ill effects of her spell. He strode over to the tree where her discarded robe hung, pinned to the tree by an arrow with a slip of a piece of paper pinned to the robe with the same arrow. Tensing up his muscles, he raised his hand and melted the tree, robe, arrow, and paralysis spell with a single blast of his poisonous aura. 

 _'Crafty.'_ Naraku admitted, turning when he heard a buzzing sound approaching. 

_'She has summoned a barrier, my queen, but we have surrounded her.'_

"Indeed." Naraku walked towards the swarm. "I will speak to her." 

 _'Yes, queen!'_ They replied in unison. They parted in mid-air as Naraku approached. Sitting with her back against a tree and holding her bow vertically with both hands; a worn-out, bruised, and bloodied Kimiko. The faint scent of her blood made him smirk.  

"How long can you keep this up, I wonder?" he asked, reaching out to test the strength of the barrier. Smaller, personal barriers tended to be tough, so he expected hers to reject him before he physically touched it. 

Nothing. 

"Hm?" Naraku placed his hand on the barrier, flinching when his hand phased right through it. Gritting his teeth, he reached out with both hands, aiming for her neck, but his hands glided through her shoulders and Naraku found himself bent over, feeling as foolish as the monkey whose pelt he wore. Through the refracted light of the illusion, Naraku saw a paper on the ground, trimmed into the vague shape of a human. Drawn on it in her blood was a five-pointed star within a circle. Holding the paper-puppet between his middle and index finger, Naraku straightened up so that he was standing again.

 _'_ _M_ _y queen?'_ his lead saimyosho inquired, inspecting the puppet closely. The wasp flinched and put an arm's length between it and Naraku's hand as his vapors melted the paper within seconds. The illusion of Kimiko dissipated instantaneously. 

"Spread out and find her." Naraku ordered, pointing in the direction she had been running before casting her deceptive spell. "She cannot have gotten far."

He followed his loyal wasps at a leisurely pace, making sure that nothing was overlooked as they combed the forest. Strangely, he couldn't find it in himself to be irritated or even slightly exasperated by Kimiko's tactics. Not only were they impressive, they were effective, and he had to give credit where credit was due. This woman was not one to fuck with. 

 _'When I find her, I will have to let her know that I'm a big fan of her work right before I strangle her.'_ He even lightly chuckled at the thought not out of malice, but excitement. Then, thoughts of the other priestess began to slither into his mind. Kikyou knew many spells, but she seemed far more defensive with her tactics. She used a longbow regardless of the terrain and rarely sought out battles. Had she adopted Kimiko's style, not a soul in the world of the living or the dead could have come close to killing her. He shuddered slightly. 

 _'Protect!'_ a saimyosho called out as three of them grouped together to take an arrow for Naraku. Their bodies disintegrated and the arrow fell to the ground. Naraku thrust his hand out, blasting the arrow into useless pieces, and then he leaped upwards to use the branches for protection again.

 _'She must be close.'_ Naraku took a moment to concentrate and when he caught a strong whiff of her blood coming from his right, he chased it. Kimiko burst from behind a tree and as he was landing, Kimiko released her arrow, hitting him in the lower body. 

"No!" Naraku cried out with shock. Dozens of tendrils and bits of flesh began to spread from his torso in an attempt to reconstruct his lower body. His gaze locked on Kimiko's. 

"You are something worse than I originally thought." She wrapped her hand around the tip of her last arrow, squeezing it tightly until blood began to run down her palm. She notched the bloody arrow and drew it back, aiming it at Naraku. "You do not belong in this world. I will guide you to the afterlife myself."

 _'I have to stop her!'_ Naraku held back an instinctive growl, thrusting all of his remaining tentacles towards her. She wasn't far from him! He could kill her before she released the arrow! ' _Now!'_ Naraku's tentacles pushed through her, lifting her into the air. Her body went limp instantly and her bow fell to the ground. In the split second Naraku realized the arrow was hovering in the air, still aimed at him, it shot forward and he had no time to defend himself or even gasp. 

All he saw was the pure-white light exploding from him. 

 _'My soul-piercer will lay your soul to rest so that you may know true peace.'_ Kimiko's voice echoed in his head. 

 _'You will have to go through the hundreds of souls I've trapped in here first!'_ Naraku responded, finding himself unable to physically speak. _'I will NOT die!'_

 

* * *

 

Monk Myatsu used his staff to swipe away some of the limbs and leaves in his path. When he came to the place where the evil aura was emanating from, he stopped in his tracks. Immediately, he felt like he was being watched angrily. The hair on the back of his neck stood up and an uncontrollable shudder shook him to his core. His body felt heavier and he felt a bit more winded. 

 _'Something is still here.'_ he realized, holding his staff with both hands, ready to defend himself. As he glanced around, his mind began to piece together the story. Bits and chunks of yokai carapaces and flesh were scattered and splattered all over the grass, trees, and dirt. Something in the shadows caught his eye and when he stepped forward to get a better look, he inhaled sharply.

Laying on her back, with her arms sprawled out and her legs crumpled beneath her, was the lifeless Priestess Kimiko.  

 _'I am too late.'_ he thought grimly, kneeling down beside the body. He counted three large holes in her torso. He straightened her legs and placed her hands on her stomach in an attempt to make her look peaceful. Her eyes, brown and wide open, stared at nothing. _'What did you see in your last moments?'_ Using two flat stones he found nearby, he pinned her eyelids shut. Silently, he placed his palms together, praying for safe passage and peace for the priestess' soul. 

After his prayer, he stood straight and reached within his robes, pulling out a pouch filled with purified sand grains. Carefully, he untied the string constricting the pouch's neck and reached inside, pinching some sand with his thumb, index, and middle fingers. 

"There is no place for your evil here." Myatsu stated firmly, casting the sand over Kimiko's body first. He pinched another amount and walked over to a pile of yokai legs. "Find your peace and leave this place." The purified sand was working better than he anticipated. It was working perfectly, in fact. His drunken mentor didn't swindle him after all. 

Within minutes, the unnaturally heavy air lightened completely. It was easier to breathe and he no longer felt like something was watching him. Even Kimiko's expression seemed softer. 

"Monk? Did you find her?" a woman called out, followed by the loud snapping of sticks. From the noise alone, Myatsu could tell she brought company. 

"Yes. Unfortunately, I was too late." Myatsu stated, pulling some of the branches out of the way for them. Four miko - three of them young and one old - stepped out, carrying flat boards tied together. They clearly assumed the high priestess was injured and needed to be carried and sadly, they were only half right. 

"Oh, no!" the old miko, Hisako, gasped. "I was afraid of this! I begged her not to go!" 

"Why?" 

"It was just a feeling I had. It didn't feel right, but she insisted it would be fine."

"No one went with her?" he asked with shock. Myatsu stepped aside to give the three younger women some space to work. They did so diligently and silently.

Hisako shook her head, pushing loose strands of her gray hair out of her face. "Kimiko-sama was a warrior first and a priestess second. She ordered us to stay and wait for you and that she would return to meet you."

"So, whatever killed her must be formidable." Myatsu said, glancing back at Kimiko's body. 

"Was." she corrected him. "Look around you." 

"She could have had more than one attacker." 

"That is true." Hisako sighed heavily. Myatsu saw her eyes glistening and assumed she was doing her best not to cry. All four miko were noticeably holding their tears in. He hoped his presence wasn't the reason why they weren't crying.  

He cleared his throat, trying not to choke up with emotions. "I cleansed the area and Priestess Kimiko's body."

"Mm. We thank you for that." Hisako hummed with a nod. When the other three miko stood, each holding a handle, Hisako cleared her throat, too. "Let's get her back to the shrine first and then I will be free to answer all your questions, Myatsu."

"Of course. I am in no hurry." 

The hike back with Kimiko's body was rough, but the miko tied her to the carrier tightly to prevent her from falling off. Not one of them broke down until they reached the Kyo Shrine. While Myatsu waited for Hisako meet with him, he rubbed some herbal ointments he brought with him onto the various cuts he received on his face, hands, and feet. Then, placing his staff across his lap, he closed his eyes and slowed his breathing, visualizing what he saw in the forest. From the different kinds of limbs and flesh he saw, it appeared that multiple yokai attacked Kimiko, but how? Her barrier was strong, so the likelihood of multiple yokai breaking through was very low. 

 _'A construct, perhaps? Those are rare, but it would explain the multiple kinds of yokai pieces. Constructs typically aren't violent, though.'_  

"Monk?" Hisako called out carefully. She apologized when Myatsu bounced a little out of shock. "Am I bothering you?" 

"No! I was just thinking." 

Hisako nodded and sat down in the grass in front of him. She folded her arms within the wide white sleeves of her kimono and cleared her throat. "So, you have questions?"

"Kind of. I am investigating a string of murders. My mentor thinks they are isolated events, but I don't agree. I think they are related and I think they are a precursor to something worse than some random, out-of-control yokai." 

"Are you speaking of Kikyou-sama's death and Iwaki?" 

"I am and there is more that I have found in between." Myatsu reached within his robes and pulled out a map. He unfolded it and used his staff to keep it flattened on the ground in front of him and Hisako. "If you start here, which is where Priestess Kikyou lived and died, then go to the next village over the mountains, that is where a priest and his granddaughter were killed. Their healer is also missing. From there, murders occurred in four places leading to Iwaki and three leaving it; two of those victims were nomadic monks, and one monk said his partner walked off into the night and never returned." 

"What is going on?" Hisako murmured incredulously.

"These murders are unexplained and the methods used to kill them were needlessly cruel. Iwaki, a city protected by a god, filled with religious citizens, was annihilated in a night."

Hisako shifted with discomfort. "Also, I heard about the odokuro attacking the warlords of the plains." 

Myatsu nodded and swallowed hard, immediately realizing how dry his mouth was. "Yes, I visited the battlefield. There were no bodies, which explains the odokuro's origin. Those lords and their families were slaughtered by the men they sent to die. When you follow the odokuro events, they lead here, and now Priestess Kimiko is dead. All of this has happened in just a few months." 

"She killed it, whatever it was." Hisako stated as she sat up stiffly.

Myatsu closed his eyes. "I hope so, but one of my goals is to warn all the religious leaders to keep their defenses up, just in case. It's clear something is specifically targeting those with religious alignments."

"But, we know what happened to Kikyou-sama. She killed the hanyou who attacked her." 

"That's what is being told, but that doesn't mean it's true. My next stop was to visit the village to see if there were any unusual circumstances surrounding her death. The only reason I didn't go there first was because I wanted to give them time to mourn her." 

Hisako's expression grew serious. "We will heed your warning and send word to our sister-shrines on the other peaks. If you do discover anything strange about Kikyou-sama's death, please come back and tell us. She was trained here and if you're right, and her death was something more, and if Kimiko-sama did not slay her attacker, then it is our duty to avenge them."

"Yes! Of course!" Myatsu agreed as he breathed a sigh of relief. Convincing most of the religious leaders to strengthen their defenses was like pulling teeth. 

_'Master, I hope you are right. I hope that I am just seeing things that aren't there.'_

 


	9. The Depth of Evil

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not even Naraku expected to crawl away with his life after the soul-piercing arrow struck him. The hundreds of souls trapped within him protected him, convincing him that everything he has done with the construction of his body has been worth it. While healing, he finds a loophole around a personal issue and is alerted that a young monk is likely following him.
> 
> The traveling monk, Myatsu, lost track of the yokai that killed Priestess Kimiko. It was almost as if it disappeared from existence instead of dying. A couple of moon cycles later, Myatsu picks up a blood-chillingly familiar aura, leading him to a gruesome scene and his first meeting with the murderous yokai itself.

Every step took more and more effort from him. As his energy dwindled, so did his control over all the yokai he used to create his body. The monk's spent body was melting and exposing the unsightly beast within. When he stumbled, he caught his fall by reaching out for a tree. Its bark began to sizzle and decay at his touch. He tried to pull away, but he remained attached to the tree because the monk's skin was slowly liquefying. Naraku growled, exerting more energy just to peel himself from the tree. The skin from his face, arm, and chest remained stuck to the bark as he finally tore away from it. 

It was such a sorry state he found himself in, but he survived. Priestess Kimiko had been truly formidable. Her final arrow wasn't meant to destroy his body; it was meant to destroy his soul. Unfortunately for her, she didn't know the depth of Naraku's soul. Surrounding his soul were the hundreds of other beings' souls he had absorbed. Kimiko's arrow couldn't destroy them all. However, the souls she did destroy were severed from Naraku's soul and control, and now the corresponding body parts were physically rotting. 

 _'Queen!'_ A familiar buzzing sound filled the air and Naraku stopped moving altogether. A handful of saimyosho now hovered around him.

"What...took you so long?" Naraku growled through his clenched teeth. 

 _'We could not find you without alerting other priestesses.'_ the lead wasp answered quickly, bowing its head. Naraku almost commented on the gesture. 

A second wasp, this one a bit smaller than the leader, twisted and squeezed its legs and claws nervously. _'I saw another human dressed in dark robes, carrying a stick with jingling rings much like the one you wielded for a time.'_

"Spiritual powers?" 

_'Yes, queen. He cleansed the priestess' body and your discarded parts.'_

"A monk." Naraku said aloud, more for himself than his wasps. What was a monk doing with miko? As if sensing his own paranoia, his hand felt around his waist. "The portable hive was destroyed." 

 _'We can make another. It will take time, though. We must gather ingredients.'_ the lead wasp said.

"I must find a safe place first. It is only a matter of time before the priestesses or monk pick up my trail." Naraku grit his teeth as a tentacle fell from one of the many tears in his body. 

_'We will carry queen until a place is found.'_

"The miko will be busy mourning Kimiko, so I want one of you to remain behind to keep an eye on the monk to make sure he doesn't follow us." he ordered. 

 _'This one will.'_ answered the wasp that saw the alleged-monk.  

Without his command or consent, the remaining saimyosho lifted Naraku into the air. It was difficult to control his aura to keep from harming them, but now that he no longer had to focus on moving, he was better able to focus on controlling his powers. 

 

* * *

 

The saimyosho were able to build a new portal to the true nest faster than he assumed. It took a nerve-wracking day of being anxious that every sound he heard was a potential slayer, but now that he was safe within the true nest, he could look back on it logically. He ordered them to build another one just to be on the safe side and to save time if it happened again.

As soon as he could, he shed all of the decaying parts from his person, tossing them in a pile in the middle of the honeycomb-shaped chamber. Soon, he looked like he usually did on his, "human," nights - a massive conglomeration of repulsiveness and imperfections - and it was something that wasn't supposed to happen for another half of a moon cycle.

 _'I should congratulate myself, though; my construction methods saved my life.'_ Overall, he wasn't terribly upset. If anything, it told him he was on the correct path to creating the perfect body. 

 _'Queen, are you finished with these parts?'_ a saimyosho asked. It was fresh out of its larval stage and when he first met them, he couldn't tell them apart or how old they were, but now, he saw each one as its own individual, young and old. 

Naraku closed his eyes, feeling on the verge of sleep. "I am, but I would advise you to leave them be for now. They are still drenched in my aura."

 _'We can adapt.'_  

His eyes snapped open. "Excuse me?"

 _'This one is most sorry! We can adapt to venom and poisons, my queen!'_ the young wasp bowed its head, clasping its claws on both front legs together. 

Naraku wondered if they were picking up on human habits and sharing them with one another now that he was exposing them to the human world. Part of him despised it, but the other part was amused that they would seek out different ways to show their loyalty and respect to him. 

_'Would you like to punish this one?'_

"No, I was just lost in thought." he answered mildly. "Now, back to the adaptation part of the conversation - how do you adapt?" 

_'We consume small portions and one day, we will be resistant.'_

"Interesting. I had no idea." Naraku had no reason not to believe it; it was exactly what he did with the spider yokai to gain control of the saimyosho. "Alert your brothers and sisters; I will have all of you to begin this process, including the larvae."

 _'Youngest brothers and sisters are too weak to withstand. Only when they have their wings will they be strong enough.'_ the wasp explained. _'My queen.'_

"I suppose that makes sense. Disregard that part of the command, but enforce the rest of it immediately." 

 _'Yes, queen!'_  

Once the wasp left, Naraku closed his eyes again. He wanted to be annoyed with the saimyosho's lack of transparency when it came to what they could and could not do, as well as what they did and did not know, but he also understood that they assumed he knew because he was their queen; omniscient and powerful. To them, educating the queen without her permission was absolutely inexcusable and even though he had explained to them before that he didn't know everything about them, they didn't wish to break their rules and risk insulting him. Ultimately, Naraku preferred their undying loyalty, even if it meant suffering a few annoying moments here and there. 

The flow of time was different within the true nest, so Naraku lost track of how long he was within the nest. When he finally acknowledged he had no idea, he ordered the saimyosho to observe the moon and what shape it took every night to help him. A moonless night came and went and Naraku didn't lose his powers that night. As quickly as he became excited, he had to remind himself that he was in a different realm as long as he stayed in the true nest and not all the realms followed the same rules. 

Intent on knowing for sure if he found a way to cheat the infamous hanyou-becomes-human curse, he deconstructed himself once more, made a few minor changes with bits and pieces his wasps drug back to him, and then he waited an entire cycle. Before night fell on the next moonless night, Naraku left the true nest.

Cool, crisp air greeted him. The green leaves of trees were now various shades of reds, yellows, and oranges. Autumn had arrived weeks ago. 

 _'I suppose I can find a new host while I wait.'_ Naraku looked down. Whatever was left of the monk's form was barely recognizable; the skin was a dull variation of every color except the natural olive tone it once held, tendrils were sticking out, various liquids leaked out of tears in the skin, and the body itself was bloated to nearly twice its size. It felt like if Naraku exhaled too forcefully, the body would explode and his, "true," form would spill out. 

Following the scent of meat roasting over an open fire, Naraku marched across the uneven, hilly landscape filled with various boulders and trees. Only humans cooked their food so boldly. Even yokai would drag their prey back to their lair first, but not humans. When he was close enough to clearly hear voices, he slowed his pace, stalking closer and closer. From what he could hear, there were at least three men. The scent of smoke made it difficult to differentiate between them. 

 _'I could just drop in, kill them all, and take my pick, but what fun would that be?'_  

However, he wanted to get a look at his prey first. His keen vision allowed him to see them from a distance and he was able to confirm there were three men. They each wore battle-seasoned bits of armor, though none of them wore a complete set. Two of them were older - specks of gray shone on their dark hair and beards - but they were still able-bodied and strong. The third man was younger, possibly just breaking into his twenties, and from the way he attentively turned his head and looked at whichever older man was speaking, Naraku could tell he was the weak-willed one of the three. He followed orders without question, hoping to please his mentors and earn their respect. 

 _'This will be too easy.'_ Naraku thought. Then, he realized the night was almost upon him, which quickened his pulse. Could he do this before he lost his power? Smiling, he silently challenged himself to do just that.  

Pressing his index and middle fingers to the trunk of a tree, he slowly pulled them away as a thin, nearly invisible thread traced his path. He connected it to an adjacent tree and repeated the motion until he had a circular web the size of a human hanging in the clearing. 

Naraku walked a little closer to the men, stomping on sticks and fallen leaves. He even made a rhythmic beat to amuse himself with. 

"Who goes there?" one of the older men bellowed. "Show yourself peacefully and maybe we won't kill you!" 

"I'll go around and check." the younger man said in a low voice. No human would have heard him. Naraku had to snort at his attempt to be clever. 

"Be quick about it, Yosuke; night is almost here." the first man grumbled. 

Naraku mirrored the young man's path and when he was close enough, Naraku began to purposely snap sticks, kick rocks, leading the man to his trap. Standing on the opposite side of the web, Naraku turned his back towards the man, making it appear that he was trying to hide. Within minutes, Naraku heard footsteps lightly approaching, avoiding every leaf, twig, and rock possible. He held back a chuckle at the young man's attempt to be sneaky. Closer and closer he crept until a breath hitched in his throat and all movement ceased. 

Naraku rose, turned to his new meat-puppet, and grinned. The man's blade was grasped with both hands and held high above his head with the intent to kill. His eyes were wide open, staring at nothing. His irises were almost completely swallowed by the black abyss of his pupils.

"Who are you traveling with?" Naraku quizzed in a low voice. 

"My father and his friend." the young man answered.

"Oh, good." Naraku leaped up on a branch and held his hands out, telekinetically moving the silky threads from the trees to his fingertips. He began to hop from branch to branch, and his puppet followed. When Naraku found a vantage point he liked, he crossed his legs as he sat. As he moved his fingers, the young man moved with them. He moved stiffly, but not so much so that it would be too obvious. 

 _'It looks like I will need practice.'_ Naraku smiled quietly at himself. The young man's presence was noticed by the other two men.

"Did you find them?" the first older man asked gruffly as he turned from the fire. He was still eating with his friend. 

"No, Father. They fled."

"Huh, I doubt that." the man replied as he shook his head. "Sheathe your blade, boy. I've told you a thousand times to only wield it when you mean to kill." 

Naraku already had him shuffling towards the two men who had let their guard down completely.

"As you wish, Father." 

"Kill the friend first." Naraku said in a low voice. The young man's blade pierced through the back of his father's friend's head, popping out of his mouth with the precision and power that only a yokai could possess. 

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" the father screamed as he jumped up.

"Killing." the son answered plainly, yanking his blade from the dead man's head. His body slid forward into the fire, nearly dousing it.

"You- I HAVE NO SON!" 

 _'So much for unconditional love.'_ Naraku thought wryly. He allowed the father to slash his son twice and when his son didn't react, his eyes widened. 

"You're possessed!" 

"No shit." Naraku said aloud. The father made his final mistake; turning to look in Naraku's direction and taking his attention off his son. Raising his blade out to the side, in one powerful swing, the son beheaded his father. The headless body crumbled to the ground and the head bounced once before settling a small distance from the rest of the body.  

 _'Just in time for nightfall.'_ He proudly jumped from the branch to the ground, using his threads to pull the young man to himself. Digging his fingers into the already-opened skin on the upper torso, Naraku shed the remainder of the monk's body and began to squeeze his amorphous form through the fresh wounds. 

"Better." Naraku said to himself, now opening and closing his new hands. Inside his mind, he could hear the young man's screams of despair. 

 _'Begone.'_ And as easy as that, the screaming stopped. 

The black sky was speckled with countless stars and only a few clouds obscured the view. Naraku stood at the top of a tree, exhaling with relief. His powers were still at full capacity, almost even more so in the darkness. 

 _'Now that I can choose my times of weakness, I don't have to worry about planning around it as much.'_  

 

* * *

_'As much as I loathe humans, I can't deny how amusing they are.'_ Naraku thought dryly. He sat in the shade of a worn down tool shack, watching two men beat each other furiously. Naraku only caught brief details - someone slept with someone's wife - but he found it to be a tad funny because it was just some silly social construct that these men were willing to maim or kill each other for. 

He understood marriages for the upper-class. They were more akin to blood pacts, but terminology was everything to humans. However, the social class system was a human construct, too. What was stopping the lower-class, which had the numbers, from storming every noble's home and taking what they wanted? Was it really that difficult for humans to live equally and mind their own individual business simultaneously? 

The fighting men had lost some of their steam, slowly rolling away from each other, panting and cursing one another. It appeared they were done, pushed to their limits, and this annoyed Naraku. He specifically followed the commotion to watch someone die. 

Using his thumb and index finger, Naraku flicked a silky thread at the man closest to him. In a low voice, he said, "You're not going to allow him to get away with disrespecting you, are you?" Naraku swiftly severed the thread, and his connection, and waited patiently. The man had stopped the moment he was caught, staring wide-eyed at nothing, but now he was blinking, staring at the ground thoughtfully as he softly rubbed a bruise on his face. 

When he broke into a sprint towards the other man, kicking him while he was still on his hands and knees, Naraku's chest swelled with pride. The fight was even more savage than before. They were digging their nails into each other's faces, punching and kicking anyone who tried to get in the way, and were now just screaming incoherently, as if the concept of language no longer meant anything to them. 

 _'That didn't take much convincing on my end.'_ he pointed out to himself when he realized he was having a bit too much fun. _'They were already furious with one another.'_

Before, Naraku used the status of a local village healer to manipulate people into thinking the worst of one of their own, but now that he was just some random traveling young man with no notable status, his word held little weight. He could take full control using his yokai abilities, but what was the fun in that? In the right moment, with the right words, all he had to do was whisper to someone and they would break, doing exactly what he wanted them to do. That was more of a challenge and Naraku, deciding he literally had nothing better to do, was more than willing to accept it.

_'This is because you burned the Shikon no Tama with your body, Kikyou; I am forced to entertain myself with these pests.'_

Two large men broke up the fight between the other two and Naraku resigned to that conclusion. They had beaten each other so severely that it was possible at least one of them had internal damage and would die eventually. Once more, he debated starting a final fight, possibly throwing the other two men into it, but a distant, alarmed buzzing noise caught his attention. He wove through the buildings and found a saimyosho waiting in a tree just out of sight of the villagers. 

Naraku held his hand up and the wasp landed on it daintily. 

_'My queen, this one was sent to inform you that the monk slayed a sister.'_

"Monk?" Naraku thought for a moment and then remembered learning of a monk after his battle with Kimiko. It felt like an eternity ago. "Is it the monk that was spotted back at the Kyo Shrine?" 

The wasp gave a small nod.  

"How far away from here is he?"

_'Two days of flight for us. Our slain sister was one you sent to watch him after your battle.'_

"Yes, I remember now. Take five of your brothers and sisters with you, track him down, and observe him from a distance." 

_'Yes, my queen. Will you have us slay him?'_

"No." he said softly. "Not yet, at least. I want to know if his presence is more than coincidence. He will be dead one way or another, but I want to be certain there isn't more to it first."

The wasp bowed before flying away and Naraku watched it, lost in thought. Considering all he had done since being born, he wasn't shocked if someone was tracking him down. 

 _'If he is following me, then he will be worth toying with for a while.'_ Naraku huffed with boredom.

 

* * *

 

Pointing his staff and closing his eyes, Myatsu made a single, stationary hand gesture to complete the silent spell to place himself in a shallow meditative state. Around him, energies swirled like a wind storm, but slowly. Every thing in the world - living or not - gave off energy to some degree. Most non-living objects gave off weaker auras as opposed to the living. Differentiating between the auras of the various kinds of life was the most difficult. Even with ten years of practice under his belt, Myatsu still had some issues. However, tuning into evil aura was his niche. 

 _'The energy trail just stops here.'_ Myatsu concluded after silently surveying the area. It had been a couple of months since Priestess Kimiko's death and as much as he tried to move on from it, he couldn't. He had seen the bloody aftermath of battles before, but the evil that surrounded hers was poignant. Since then, he hadn't found anything quite like it. He had exercised the vengeful spirit of a man murdered by his family, helped purify and rebuild a desecrated shrine that was causing a blight to fall over a large fishing village, and slayed a giant wasp the size of a cat, but none of those things alone or combined came close to the aura of Kimiko's killer. A small part of him was glad he hadn't encountered it again.

Until the previous day, that is. The previous day was a chilling reminder of what horrors still remained in the world. 

Crows were innocent animals that just happened to have bad reputations and one of those bad reputations was devouring dead bodies. Seeing dozens of them was usually a bad sign more often than not during the recent warring times. So, of course, when Myatsu spotted some in the sky, circling around an area lazily, signaling others to join them for a feast, he begrudgingly hiked higher up the cliffs and stumbled upon the dead bodies of two men just past their prime. One had been stabbed through the back of the head and out of his mouth; the other man had been cleanly decapitated. Their bodies' conditions told Myatsu that their killer was a few days ahead, but once he read the energies, he found a trace of the aura he encountered near Kimiko's body. It chilled him to the bone and it made him nauseous. Cleansing and burying the bodies put him behind even more, and now the trace of evil aura was fading away, mixing and twisting with the other energies of the world. 

 _'It's a strong yokai; it's probably even farther ahead because it doesn't need to consistently rest like I do.'_ Myatsu realized. Almost ready to give up, he reminded himself that whatever kind of yokai this was, it wasn't going to stop killing people. He was certain he would pick up its trail once again and unfortunately, that meant others were going to die or already had and he just hadn't found them yet. 

The sky was turning dark orange by the time Myatsu was able to find an empty traveler's shack located near the intersection of two trails. It was pit style - dug into the earth with short wooden columns upholding twigs and brown straw. That excited him because those tended to be warmer than the more common elevated shelters. After making sure it wasn't an ambush of some sort, he squeezed inside and built a small fire in the sunken irori at the center for some warmth.

 _'This coldness must be a sign of a bad winter approaching.'_ Out of his travel pack, he pulled a pair of black tobi over his feet to help warm them. Myatsu tried to brave the elements as much as possible to strengthen his mind and body, but he also didn't want to lose limbs. 

He nibbled away the last strip of jerky he had and finished the last two bites of a clump of rice he forgot he had. His journey was going to have to hold off until he was able to acquire more food. Once the fire spent itself, Myatsu covered up with a plain gray hanten that the miko gave to him for his mission. 

The following morning was freezing. If Myatsu hadn't known any better, he would have thought he slept through the rest of autumn and woke on the winter solstice. He didn't think twice about leaving the tobi on his feet this time and when a cold breeze sliced through him, he pulled the large hanten over his head like a hood to protect his ears and body. 

The sun finally rose after a few hours of hiking and gave him a tease of warmth. A slow, billowing cloud of smoke caught his attention and he sighed with relief. It was likely a village, which meant he could restock supplies. Judging the surrounding terrain, he estimated he would be upon the village by mid-afternoon. It would cut his daytime travel a bit short, but the wind whipping him convinced him that today wasn't the day to engage a yokai anyway. 

 _'If I do not find anymore clues soon, then I need to head back home and report my findings.'_ Myatsu decided. He didn't like giving up, but he was low on his sutras and purifying sands. Without those, his ability to help with yokai was hindered greatly. 

As he closed in on the village, despite not being able to feel his nose, a scent began to grow stronger. That wasn't just a fire from multiple homes or a smithy - it was a single, large fire. Fear and anxiety filled his body with a coldness worse than the weather and he began to jog towards the dark gray cloud. He only stopped once and it was to listen for any voices, but he heard nothing. 

 _'Please, let it just be a wildfire or a ceremony!'_ he prayed hastily. 

It wasn't either of those things; it was exactly as he feared. A once-healthy village was now burning to the ground. Bodies of villagers - men, women, and children - were scattered everywhere. A few were even hanging from roofs by their hands, mouths open in silent, endless screams. It was likely the result of bandits. As terrible as yokai attacks were, human ones were almost worse in his experience. 

Before stepping out into the open, Myatsu held out his staff and closed his eyes, searching the nearby energies. The fires were making it difficult. They were as ruinous to auras as they were to the physical world. 

 _'Damn it!'_ He began to panic, so he pressed his hand to his chest and tried to force himself to breathe slower. _'Should I call out and see if anyone is still alive?'_ It would possibly save a life or two, but it could also mean the end of his. Myatsu found a few rocks and tossed them as hard as he could, hoping the sound would stir something. His third rock startled some chickens, which struck him as odd immediately. _'Why wouldn't they take the chickens for food?'_  

"Hello?" Myatsu called out, straining to raise his voice above the roaring of flames. The smoke stung his eyes and choked him slightly, so he backed up and stuck to the edge of the village's boundary. "Is anybody alive? Make a loud noise!" 

"Help!" a small voice cried out. Myatsu turned around, desperately searching for the origin of the voice. 

"Louder, please!" 

"Over here!" another voice insisted. 

 _'Children!'_ Myatsu grimaced as he ran to a shack housing several piles of loose hay. As soon as he pulled a layer away with his hand, two small faces stared up at him, wide-eyed and dirty. One was a girl and the other a slightly older boy.

"I'm not going to hurt you! Are there others?" he asked them. Immediately, five more children rose from the hay. They were holding one another and shivering. Without a second thought, he pulled the hanten from his body and wrapped it around them. It was large enough for all seven of them to huddle beneath. "Come on! It isn't safe here!" 

 _'Is anywhere truly safe?'_ he lamented, looking around to make sure there was no one else. He led the children into a plowed field. It looked mostly untouched, which struck another odd nerve of his. Did the attackers not need any food? It looked like none of them even tried to see if anything was salvageable nor did they burn the field so it couldn't be used for the next season. His instincts were leaning away from human bandits being the culprits with every passing moment. 

As he hoped, there was a small shack at the other side of the field, far enough away from the flames to be safe. It was filled with various farming tools that he removed to create more space. 

"In here! Hurry!" he urged. The children stared back at him blankly, still huddled beneath his hanten. Myatsu swallowed hard and bowed his head. "I know you're scared, but this is the best I can do for now! Please, before-" 

The youngest and shortest boy burst forward from under the hanten, swiftly and silently. Myatsu jumped and side-stepped him instinctively, but when the boy stopped and turned around, he saw the knife clasped in his small, burned hands. 

"Wait! I'm not here to hurt y-" Hands grabbed his legs and pulled them from under him. His arms folded to protect his head from the fall; his torso hit so hard he was certain a rib cracked. The other six children were now climbing on him, holding him down for the knife-wielding boy. No one said a word. Reluctantly, Myatsu threw his right elbow backwards, hitting someone somewhere, and it allowed him to slip away and rise to his feet. 

Myatsu's eyes scanned each one until he saw the eldest girl had blood running from her nose. _'I hit her in the nose...and she made no sound!'_ Even the most seasoned of warriors would at least grunt when given bloodied noses!

The knife with the boy attached flew at his gut again, the other children following him without a spoken word. Myatsu ran into the thin patch of trees, wondering where to go, what to do! He was being attacked by seven children! One of their hands latched onto his robes with just enough force to cause him to stumble and fall to his hands and knees.

"Shit!" Myatsu shrieked, rolling away to dodge the knife, which was now being wielded by the eldest boy. It stuck into the frosted ground with a thump. Myatsu hopped back to his feet, knocking aside the youngest girl who charged at him. She fell on her side, but flipped back onto her feet like an experienced fighter. 

 _'They must be possessed!'_ he concluded, jumping to the side to avoid one of the other boy's charge. He finally spun around until all seven children were in front of him. Their eyes were all open, but none of them seemed to be, "looking," at anything. He gripped his staff harder, trying to seek out their auras. Each child had their own aura, which made his heart drop to his stomach. _'They're all still alive; it's just a spell!'_  

Myatsu's quickened breaths were causing the discomfort of his fall to become noticeable. Every pant told him that a rib was certainly cracked.

_'A yokai must be behind this! No human has this kind of power!'_

One girl and one boy ran towards either side of him. He stabbed his staff into the ground, using his hands to shove them down. His impatience flared up and he jerked his staff from the ground, holding it up to issue a challenge. "Show yourself! Only a coward uses children as a shield!" 

"A shield?" a deep voice repeated immediately. It reflected a chilling calmness, as if the one who possessed it had expected this to happen. "You are mistaken, monk."

"Am I?" Myatsu shouted angrily, pointing at the silent children. "I see seven child-like shields! Fight me yourself!" 

"Why would I do that? This seems far more upsetting." 

The oldest boy approached Myatsu slowly, who jabbed the blunt end of his staff into the his gut. Next, he reached for the knife and ripped it from the boy's hand and then knocked him backwards into the grass. He slipped the knife into his obi to keep the others from wielding it. 

"What do you want with me?" Myatsu grunted, turning to the side and lifting his leg to block punches from the other two boys. They bounced off his thigh harmlessly, allowing him to hold his staff horizontally and push them onto their backs into the ground. 

 _'I can easily overpower them, but I can't do this forever! I don't want to hurt them!'_  

"I should be asking you that question." 

Myatsu's eyes widened. Had he found it? "A-Are you the one who killed Priestess Kimiko?" 

"I suspect you already know the answer." 

"You son of a bitch! Fight me! What are you gaining from watching me fight children?" 

"Amusement." the voice answered without missing a beat. "However, I do see your point. As an experienced adult, you are simply too much for them." 

"Yes!" Myatsu insisted. "This is an easy fight! It can't be that entertaining to watch!" 

"I agree. Children, seeing as you are all of similar age, size, and experience, fight each other to the death instead." 

"NO!" Myatsu cried out, but it was too late. The seven children turned and crashed into each other like tumbling boulders. None of them screamed or cried, though. Whatever spell they were under had numbed them to pain or any emotion. 

Reaching into his robe, he pulled out his pouch of purified sand. "Free these children from evil and show them mercy!" Pinching the bottom of the pouch, he thrust it slightly upwards towards the children, creating an arc that would scatter the sand enough to rain it down on all of them. He slapped his hands together, curling his fingers to create the proper gesture to channel his spiritual energy through the sand in hopes of amplifying its effect.

A gust of wind signaled energy being dispersed. The children all fell over, losing consciousness. Myatsu began rolling them off each other to prevent them from crushing or suffocating themselves. A hand brushed against his side and before he could push away, the hand was replaced with a sharp, burning pain. Myatsu screamed and pressed his free hand to the area, a warm liquid leaking between his fingers. Now on his back and panting, he looked up at his attacker. 

The youngest girl had slipped the knife from his obi and was standing still as a tree and staring straight ahead at nothing. 

"You missed one." The voice no longer sounded amused; it was still cold, but now filled with malice. "Kill the others." 

"N-No!" Myatsu rolled to his knees and the tips of his fingers brushed the right sleeve of her brown kimono as something knocked into his injured side. He roared in agony and frustration, cringing harshly. 

A light thud followed by gargling noises made him panic, but his body wasn't able to move yet! One of the girls was grasping aimlessly at her throat, eyes wide with terror as she tried to scream. The girl wielding the knife now stood over the oldest girl. 

"Stop! Please! They're just children!" he begged as he used both hands and feet to spring himself at her. Again, something knocked into him, but this time, it slammed him into a tree and pinned him to it. When he peeled his eyes open and the tears fell from them, he saw a forest-green scaly tendril pressing into his midsection. He could not see what it was attached to, though.  

"They're orphans now; their chances of living purposeful lives are next to zero."

Another thud; more gargling noises mixed with hints of a whimper. 

"If you found someone to take them in, they will likely be used as slaves." 

A third thud was followed by the sound of the youngest boy gasping and coughing. 

"The girls will be sold to pleasure houses." the yokai continued dispassionately. "The boys, if they don't die and make it to the proper age, will be war fodder."

Myatsu coughed, tensing up as a harsh throb cracked through his side and chest. "You...killed their...families! You...doomed...them!"

The yokai waited for the final three stabs before chuckling. "Yes, and now I am freeing them of my evil and showing them mercy, as you requested."

 _'I'm too...weak.'_ Myatsu closed his eyes and lowered his head as the final girl aimed the blood-drenched blade at her throat. Because of the spell, she didn't make a sound except when her body hit the ground. Myatsu's body felt like it weighed more than a mountain and that was his last thought before falling into a forced sleep.

A ragged cough woke Myatsu from unconsciousness. He grit his teeth and strained every muscle in his body in reaction to the pain pounding through his chest and his left side. The coldness of the day only made it worse. His hand reached out, seemingly without his command, and his fingers dug into the ground, bracing his arm as he pushed himself up. His sight was blurry with fatigue and misery; he turned his back to the motionless lumps in the grass just steps away from him. 

Myatsu began to stiffly shamble back to the village, which was still smoking heavily as flames lapped at the sky. It was still daylight out, so he must not have been unconscious for long.

 _'Why didn't the yokai kill me? Did it think I died?'_ His right hand was stuck against his wound; fresh and dry blood caked between his hand and robes. _'No. It planned all of this for me specifically. I'm alive because it wants me to be.'_

"Almost...there...almost...there!" he coached himself between every breath and step, both of which were forced and rigid. The heat from the smoldering village was bittersweet. It was the result of tragedy, but at the same time, his steadily-freezing body was drinking it in deeply. He stopped every few minutes because he was exhausted and bleeding out, but also because forcing his body going from one extreme temperature to another so suddenly would kill him before the stab wound. As much as he desperately wanted the warmth to engulf him, he paced himself, spoke aloud to himself about restraint, repeated his mentor's lessons - anything to keep his mind off the agonizing situation he was in. 

The first flame he stumbled upon on the outskirts was his personal savior. He collapsed to his knees in front of it, panting, coughing, trembling, and cursing. In the few hours he had been gone, many of the village's structures had destabilized, causing them all to collapse in on themselves. Earlier that morning, many of the people were waking up, preparing to work hard and prepare for winter. The ruinous aftermath he was observing now was completely senseless. Myatsu hated to admit it, but even raids by human bandits had some semblance of reason. Soldiers usually needed supplies or wished to destabilize a valuable asset of an enemy - cruel and dishonorable, yes, but they had their reasons. 

There was no reason for the wicked yokai to have done any of what it did to this place or its children. Not one drop of blood had any reason to be spilled whatsoever. It could have easily garnered the same amount of his attention by confronting him directly or continuing leaving bits of aura for him to follow aimlessly. Even worse, it was apparent that the yokai knew this and went ahead with its elaborate, destructive plan to simply upset him. That was it. Hundreds of lives and all their hard work were gone because a yokai didn't like being followed by a human monk. 

 _'No! It never told me not to! It's daring me to follow it!'_ he realized with horror. As his eyes scanned over the devastation once more, the image of the dead children flashed in his mind, and the fact that he was still alive set in; the message became loud and clear. This was all a game and he played right into it. 

 _'The evil yokai must die!'_ Myatsu pulled his robes down from his torso, inspecting his stab wound. It didn't look as terrible as he thought, but without treatment, an infection would kill him easily. He had nothing with him to even cover it, let alone treat it. Grabbing a broken piece of wood from the fire he was sitting next to, he gently waved it around until the flame was nearly dead. 

As the panic began to fill his throbbing chest, he began taking deep breaths and pushing all thoughts of doubt and fear from his mind. "I can do this, I can do this, I can do this!" He pressed it to his wound and a loud, raw scream erupted from his throat. He tossed the piece of charred wood away from himself and bent over to ride out the pain. A groan turned into a sob, and before Myatsu could stop himself, he began sobbing uncontrollably. 


End file.
